Perhaps a frothy bubble bath, a spot of tea, and a cushy robe would help poor Michelle Obama work through her past traumas, like being married to former president Barack Obama and having to pay for food while living at the White House.

Instead, she has been working out her imagined hardships in public interviews and podcasts, like a public therapy session nobody asked for.

Michelle lashed out at her husband in the cruelest way on this week’s podcast that she shares with her brother, IMO with Michelle Obama & Craig Robinson, basically saying she would not want a child that turned out like him. Is there a higher insult one can give a spouse?  

During a discussion about parenting sons, radio host and guest Angie Martinez told Michelle, a mother of two daughters, she should have had sons. Michelle recoiled at the thought.

“I’m so glad I didn’t have a boy! Because he would have been a Barack Obama. … No! I would have felt for him,” Michelle said, during an episode in which she offered nearly an hour of life coaching to the parents of sons.

This week’s conversation about sons was spurred on by what appeared to be a prewritten question about the podcast’s alleged listener’s 17-year-old son.

“I sometimes worry the environment around him pushes toxic forms of masculinity. His friends are over all the time. … I can’t help but overhear some of the stuff they talk about: girls being either hot or ugly, which guys are the best and worst at football. It seems like a verbal competition for who can be the toughest and most callous in the group,” listener Jessica said. “I feel like I’m seeing early stages of boys getting caught up in unhealthy ideas of what it means to be a man. The version of my son that I see with his friends is a lot different than the version I see without them. … What are the values you’ve worked to instill in your own sons to help them navigate all of this?

Hey, “Jessica,” if you want advice on raising sons, maybe don’t go to an apparently unstable woman who never had any, didn’t want any, and seems to have problems with masculinity. Even if she did have sons, Michelle Obama at this point in her life doesn’t seem to be in the best frame of mind to be giving family advice.

The podcast’s parenting episode was not the first time Michelle has complained about her husband. In a 2022 Revolt TV interview, she said she “couldn’t stand” Barack for about 10 years when the children were young. They have been married for 30 years, and for a third of their marriage she didn’t like him?

That was not a one-time comment. She repeated it again a few months ago on her podcast.

“Sometimes people who date don’t realize that, you know, in long-term relationships, you’re going … to have deep, deep dips,” The former first lady said. “I tell people — and folks think this is harsh — you’re going to have a bad decade.”

Invite this former first couple to a dinner party, and someone is going to kick poor, unhinged Michelle under the table. It is bad etiquette to insult your spouse in public because it makes everyone uncomfortable and wounds your spouse. The nation doesn’t agree with Barack Obama’s politics, but his wife at least should have his back on a personal level. It appears that she doesn’t.

Another example that raises concerns about Michelle’s wellness is her recent complaint that, while in the White House her family had to (trigger warning) pay for their own food. Who does that? Oh wait, everyone who is not on SNAP pays for their own food. And when flying without the president, on the first lady’s airplane, the Obamas had to (trigger warning) pay for their daughters’ travel.

Isn’t that what taxpayers are for?

Michelle Obama’s claim that living in the White House was ‘expensive’ because she had to pay for her own food is a jaw-dropping display of privilege that’s hard to stomach. Let’s break this down. While the First Family does cover personal expensed
they also had a $400,000… pic.twitter.com/kUr9jkfqiz

— Hosna ⚖️ (@DOGEQEEN) May 3, 2025

It all sounds really hard. No wonder she is back in therapy, as she disclosed on Jay Shetty’s podcast. On that podcast, and again on her own podcast this week, Michelle explained that she is “transitioning” from active parent to empty nester, and for the first time in her life she is calling the shots.   

“I really feel like, at 60, this is the first time that all my decisions are for me. I don’t think that, you know, there has been a point in life — my life — where — at least after being married and having kids — that my choices were always somehow wrapped up in what they needed … and this is a period of freedom,” Michelle said in her podcast on parenting boys.

It is a bit crazy that she has not felt free before now, especially with an estimated net worth of $70 million, according to The Network Journal. Money offers freedom to pay for her daughters’ weddings without worry. Freedom to never worry about affording retirement. Freedom to buy a private island, to add to her collection of mansions, if she wants. That kind of scratch offers the freedom to do just about anything at all.  

A lot of people would be satisfied with two grown daughters, a husband who became president, $70 million, and enough personal clout that people are interested in what her podcast has to say. She could do so much good with her voice. That she squanders her time with personal complaints about having to buy food in the White House and public commentary about not wanting a son who would turn out like her husband suggests she is not well.

The rest of us are just out here appreciating what we have, living basically happy lives, contributing more to the world than unsolicited advice from a troubled woman living a charmed life that she can’t stop complaining about.

Beth Brelje is an elections correspondent for The Federalist. She is an award-winning investigative journalist with decades of media experience.