Amid on-going rumors that her marriage to former President Barack Obama is on the rocks, former first lady Michelle Obama echoed some concerning statements on her podcast this past week — including an eerie prediction about her own death.
Is Michelle spiraling out of control with personal issues? Or is she just thinking deeply about her life and mortality?
Here’s what happened.
Michelle spoke candidly on Wednesday’s episode of her brother Craig Robinson’s “IMO” podcast, revealing that Barack Obama allegedly told her that she was “next up” to die following the passing of her 86-year-old mother in 2024.
She highlighted the way her life changed after she lost her mother and said that her husband’s reality-check on the topic of mortality was brutally real, according to a May 8 clip shared by ENews.
Michelle Obama shared that husband Barack Obama joked she was “next up” after the death of her mother, Marian Robinson, in 2024. https://t.co/WMQzev4pZH pic.twitter.com/Zzg30MR1cx
— E! News (@enews) May 9, 2025
“I guess if anything, with mom’s loss, I think that — thank God you’re my big brother and I have a husband who’s older,” she said. “Barack was saying, you know, ‘Well, you’re next up.’”
Michelle told her brother that she pushed back on her husband’s statement.
“And I was like, ‘I’m not really ready to be next up.’ I told him, ‘You’re next up and Craig is next up,’” she said.
The former first lady said she flipped the script after receiving the blunt reality-check from her husband.
“I delegate that power to you,” she said, adding that Barack would likely pass away first since he is older.
Adulthood truly begins when a person’s parents are no longer in the position of “managing and maintaining,” she said.
Michelle and Craig lost their father, Fraser C. Robinson III, in 1991 at the age of 55. Their mother, Marian Robinson, passed away in May 2024.
Michelle has recently been opening up about her innermost thoughts and feelings as part of her transformational change.
She has been open about focusing on herself more since being relieved of the duties that came along with being a first lady.
She said on the Jay Shetty Podcast that she is returning to therapy and talking with a “new person that’s getting to know” her while diving into her personal issues with more focus.
“I’m 60 years old. I’ve finished a really hard thing in my life with my family intact, I’m an empty nester. My girls are in — you know, they’ve been launched,” she said.
Michelle has continued to publically debunk rumors that her marriage is in trouble.
The Obamas have been flooded by divorce gossip after Michelle skipped numerous high-profile public events earlier this year — including former President Jimmy Carter’s funeral and President Donald Trump’s inauguration.
“If I were having problems with my husband, everybody would know about it,” she told entrepreneur Steven Bartlett in an interview last week.
“I would be problem-solving in public, like, ‘Let me tell you what he did’.”