Michelle Obama Opens Up About The 'Tough Times' In Her Marriage
Michelle and Barack Obama seem like they have a rock-solid marriage, but it hasn't always been smooth sailing for the couple. She recently opened up about some of the more difficult periods in their relationship on The Michelle Obama Podcast (via People).
"There were times that I wanted to push Barack out of the window," said the former first lady. "And I say that because it's like, you've got to know the feelings will be intense. But that doesn't mean you quit. And these periods can last a long time. They can last years."
Obama said that relationships are work, but facing a rough time doesn't mean that things can't be fixed. "Young couples, they face these challenges and they're ready to give up because they think they're broken," she said. "And I just want to say, look, if that breaks a marriage, then Barack and I have been broken off and on, throughout our marriage, but we have a very strong marriage. And if I had given up on it, if I had walked away from it, in those tough times, then I would've missed all the beauty that was there as well," the mother of two remarked.
Michelle Obama thinks people would 'have better marriages' if they did this
Obama's advice for a lasting relationship? Pick a partner as if you were "picking your basketball team." She said, "We'd have better marriages. If you're looking at a team, the people you want to win with, then number one, you want everybody on your team to be strong, right? You don't want any weak links, you don't want somebody that you can dominate.
She added, "Also, if you're on a team, you've got to be able to do everything —especially in basketball, it's like, you would never pick somebody that says, 'I only dribble. I don't shoot, I don't defend, I just dribble.'"
This is far from the first time Obama has been so frank about her marriage. She's made no secret of the fact that she and her husband have sought counseling to help them through some rough patches in their relationship. "Marriage counseling, for us, was one of those ways where we learned to talk out our differences," she once said on Good Morning America (via The Hill).