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Johannesburg - Former American first lady Michelle Obama gets candid in her new memoir about her pregnancy and marriage struggles.
In her upcoming book, Becoming, Michelle reveals that she’d had a miscarriage and used IVF (in vitro fertilisation) to conceive her daughters, Malia and Sasha, E News reports.
“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,” Obama said in the exclusive interview with Good Morning America anchor Robin Roberts.
“We sit in our own pain, thinking that somehow we’re broken.”
Michelle says that when she turned 34 years old, she realised the “biological clock is real”.
“That’s one of the reasons why I think it’s important to talk to young mothers about the fact that miscarriages happen and the biological clock is real, because egg production is limited and I realised that as I was 34 and 35. We had to do IVF.
“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,” she said.
The 54-year-old also revealed that her seemingly strong marriage with former American president Barack Obama hasn’t been without its struggles, ABC News reports.
WATCH AN EXCERPT FROM THE INTERVIEW HERE:
“For those young people out there who think that marriage is supposed to be easy . . . Marriage counselling for us was one of those ways where we learned how to talk out our differences,” the mom of two said.
She also realised over the years that she needed to “take care of herself”.
“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. It’s important for me to take care of myself – that’s not on Barack,” Michelle 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 has a phenomenal marriage and who love each other – we work on our marriage and we get help with our marriage when we need it.”
Sources: E News, Good Morning America, ABC
