Kate Middleton without makeup shocked Britain (PHOTO)

I sincerely hope that it was Prince William’s turn to do the early childcare shift at the weekend.
Because judging by pictures of Kate out shopping in Chelsea on Friday afternoon, she was long overdue a lie-in.

With her normally lustrous and bouncy hair scraped into an updo and her eyes puffy and lined, the 33-year-old Duchess of Cambridge looked absolutely shattered as she left Peter Jones, the Sloane Square department store.

Along with her shopping, she was clutching a checked tablecloth under one arm.
Some online critics unkindly suggested that Kate – wrapped up in a £325 houndstooth coat from Reiss – looked closer to 40 than 30. 

But if you take into account the week she’s just had, it’s hardly surprising.

With no fewer than three official engagements, including a formal diplomatic reception at Buckingham Palace, a charity day in the City of London and a visit to an addiction centre in Warminster. 

Events at which Kate is under the spotlight to a much greater extent than her husband – she is now fully immersed in the juggling act that is resuming royal duties whilst being a hands-on mother.

These events are draining enough – all that constant good cheer, all that being introduced to people you’re supposed to know but can’t for the life of you remember the names of – without having to cope with two small children.

One of whom, as William pointed out last week, has suddenly woken up to the concept of what Christmas really means – ie. a sack full of presents opened riotously at dawn.

With baby Charlotte just seven months old, and George, two, a full-on toddler, Kate is deep in what my friends and I used to call the ‘baby tunnel’. 

And it doesn’t matter how much extra help from kind relatives or paid staff or sympathetic husbands you have, there’s really no getting away from the fact that you’ve got two tiny children and life is exhausting. 

Here’s a woman who gave birth just a few months ago, and apart from a few weeks off official duties, she really hasn’t stopped. I know: plenty of women manage it, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy.

And, of course, few of us have to do it in the full glare of the cameras. I don’t think I wore a scrap of make-up when my children were of a similar age. 

I could barely muster the strength to have a shower, let alone put on a tiara and a ball gown and go out glad-handing the great and the good. Is it any wonder, then, that when captured off-duty, the duchess seems weary and troubled? 

Show me a woman hosting her family for Christmas – as Kate will be at Anmer Hall in Norfolk – who isn’t at this time of year.

But for all the outside scrutiny, Kate’s biggest critic is, I suspect, herself. She’s a woman of extreme drive and determination, as we saw when she and William were courting. 

She gave birth to both her children in the same unflinchingly professional manner, posing on the steps of the hospital looking immaculate just hours after the arrival of Charlotte.

The idea that she might cut herself some slack after an exhausting week and curl up in front of the telly with a plate of crumpets and a cup of tea is inconceivable to someone as personally uncompromising as Kate.
And like any woman trapped in the ‘baby tunnel’ right now, she almost certainly doesn’t realise quite how tired she is.

These pictures might just show her – and be the wake-up call she needs to finally do what everyone is probably begging her to do: slow down, stop being such a perfectionist and have a well-deserved rest. It is Christmas, after all.