Ahead of the release of her new book, “Becoming,” which is due out Nov. 13, former First Lady Michelle Obama spoke to Robin Roberts on Sunday about love, kids and the current presidential administration.
Holding nothing back, Obama spoke candidly about meeting her husband, President Barack Obama, the lust she feels for him and their struggles to conceive.
The Obamas tied the knot in 1992, but met when she mentored him at Sidley Austin LLP, a law firm in Chicago, Illinois. Obama revealed that although she was hesitant to start up a relationship with one of the firm’s few black summer associates, Barack was persistent.
“He was like, ‘You’re crazy. We should date. I like you. You like me,'” Obama told Roberts. “I like that about him. He was very straightforward.”
The two eventually had an ice cream date, which was when the couple shared their first kiss.
“He played it real smooth,” Obama recalled. “He just leaned in for a kiss. And that really was it. You know, from that kiss on … it was love. And he was my man.”
On the topic of lust, Roberts mentioned that it isn’t something former first ladies tend to discuss, but Obama said, “I don’t know what to tell you. It was there. It still is. I love my husband a lot.”
Obama also spoke about how she and her husband struggled with infertility through the years, suffering one miscarriage and conceiving their two daughters — Malia, 20, and Sasha, 17 — through in-vitro fertilization.
“I felt lost and alone and I felt like I failed because I didn’t know how common miscarriages were because we don’t talk about them. We sit in our own pain, thinking that somehow we’re broken,” Obama said. “… I realized that as I was 34 and 35. We had to do IVF [in-vitro fertilization]. I think it’s the worst thing that we do to each other as women, not share the truth about our bodies and how they work and how they don’t work.”
The former First Lady went on to talk about her marital difficulties.
“Marriage counseling for us was one of those ways where we learned how to talk out our differences. What I learned about myself was that my happiness was up to me. And I started working out more. I started asking for help, not just from him, but from other people.
I stopped feeling guilty,” Obama said. “I know too many young couples who struggle and think that somehow there’s something wrong with them. And I want them to know that Michelle and Barack Obama, who have a phenomenal marriage and who love each other, we work on our marriage. And we get help with our marriage when we need it.”
By: Maytinee Kramer
