(The Hill) - Michelle Obama on Tuesday appeared to open up publicly for the first time about her decision to skip President Trump's inauguration, saying she's at the point in her life where she's choosing "to do what was best" for herself.
"I get to look at my calendar, which I did this year, with a real big example of me, myself, looking at something that I was supposed to do — without naming names — and I chose to do what was best for me. Not what I had to do. Not what I thought other people wanted me to do," the former first lady told Sophia Bush on the actor's podcast, "Work in Progress," released Tuesday.
"That was an important test for me, just as a woman, as an independent person. Because like all women and a lot of people, I operate from guilt," Obama, 61, said.
"What should I do? What is the best thing for everybody else?" she continued. "Because it's easier for me to say, 'Well, I did this because it was what I was supposed to do."
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Obama skipped Trump's inauguration in January. The absence came just weeks after she was not among the former first family members to attend the funeral service for former President Carter in Washington. Former President Obama attended both affairs.
Without mentioning either event directly, Obama told Bush, "We as women, I think we struggle with disappointing people."
"I mean, so much so that this year people... they couldn't even fathom that I was making a choice for myself that they had to assume that my husband and I are divorcing,' Obama said of questions about her relationship with the former president. The Obamas wed in 1992.
"This couldn't be a grown woman just making a set of decisions for herself, right?" she exclaimed.
"But that's what society does to us."
'We start actually, finally going, 'What am I doing? Who am I doing this for?' And if it doesn't fit into the sort of stereotype of what people think we should do, then it gets labeled as something negative and horrible," the "Becoming" author and former lawyer said.
"The interesting thing is that when I say no, for the most part people are like, 'I get it.' And I'm OK. And that's the thing that we as women I think struggle with disappointing people," Obama said.
