Michelle Obama opens up on her podcast and gets personal with listenersMichelle Obama Podcast. The former first lady is being vulnerable and normalizing conversations about health, female bodies, and transitions that happen throughout women’s lives. Obama shared her personal experience with hot flashes and menopause.
‘We Were Taught To Be Ashamed Of It’
A podcast episode aptly titled “The Episode” “What Your Mother Never Told You About Health with Dr. Sharon Malone,”Obama shared her personal experience with menopause, puberty, and her own experiences. She thought about how her mom helped her prepare for puberty, but not all women have the same conversations. Talking about puberty and hormonal changes for women is taboo.
Obama wants to change that. She’s being honest about transitions that occur within her body. The former first lady is also making it her personal mission help women feel at ease with their bodies. From puberty to menopause, Obama discussed how women’s bodies are always changing.
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“When you think of all that a woman’s body has to do over the course of her lifetime,”She remarked, “going from being prepared to give birth to actually giving birth, and then having that whole reproductive system shut down in menopause, right? The changes, the highs and lows, and the hormonal shifts, there is power in that. But we were taught to be ashamed of it and to not even seek to understand it or explore it for our own edification, let alone to help the next generation.”
Marine One: A Hot Flash
Michelle Obama is normalizing discussions about the menopause transition. In fact, Michelle Obama shared that she had perimenopause as early as her 30s. “I have a very healthy baseline, and also, well, I was experiencing hormone shifts because of infertility, having to take shots and all that,” admitted Obama. “I experienced the night sweats, even in my 30s, and when you think of the other symptoms that come along, just hot flashes, I mean, I had a few before I started taking hormones.”
She also recalled hot flashes while aboard Marine One. “I remember having one on Marine One,” continued Obama. “I’m dressed, I need to get out, walk into an event, and, literally, it was like somebody put a furnace in my core and turned it on high, and then everything started melting. And I thought, ‘Well, this is crazy. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t do this.’”
Hot flashes don’t stop just because you’re the first lady. Obama is aware that women will benefit from talking about menopause. She is determined to help women feel more at ease with their bodies. Obama does exactly that by talking about menopause.