During the White House Working Families summit, President Obama talked about policies regarding working mums, and Michelle revealed that the first time she really struggled as a working mum was when her daughter Sasha was four-months-old and her babysitter had quit.
"[It] was probably the worst time of my motherhood. I was so devastated because that balance, that work-family balance is so fragile, and you realise how fragile it is that with a blink of an eye - a broken toilet, a sick child, a sick parent, that balance is thrown off."
She said she was about to quit her job, until she got a call from the University of Chicago Hospital. They wanted her to come for an interview, and since her babysitter had quit, she brought four-month-old Sasha with her:
“Who I was at the time was a breastfeeding mother of a 4-month-old -- and I didn’t have a babysitter, so I promptly took Sasha to the interview with me. And I thought, look, this is who I am. I've got a husband who’s away. I've got two little babies. They are my priority. If you want me to do the job, you’ve got to pay me to do the job and you’ve got to give me flexibility, and flexibility means that I will work my tail off for you, but you better pay me and value my family.”
While life as a working parent is much easier for her these days as she lives in the White House, she says she is adamant about making a change others:
"The fight isn't about us. It's about every mother and father out there who doesn’t have the leverage to make those demands... And it is not lost on either me or Barack how tough it is, which is why we all have to be in this fight. This is something that we're doing for each other.”
