Michelle Obama Says She ‘Had to Stop’ After 2 Kids, But Barack Wanted 3

As Kylie Kelce prepares to welcome baby No. 4, Michelle Obama is sharing why she didn’t go beyond two.

“You’re doing it a fourth time. I just had to stop,” Obama, 61, said of her own motherhood journey on the Thursday, March 20, episode of Kylie’s “Not Gonna Lie” podcast. “I was like, ‘I think I’ve been lucky with these two.’”

Michelle noted that her husband, former president Barack Obama, had hopes for expanding their family. “Barack was like, ‘We should have a third,’ and I was like, ‘Dude,’” she quipped.

Referring to the couple’s two daughters — Malia, 26, and Sasha, 23 — Kylie, 32, said that if she had children that were “good sleepers,” she would “call it” after two kids, as well. “I’m thinking, ‘We’re gonna get a crazy one.’ It’s just the role of the dice,” Michelle replied. “So, I admire your courage.”

Kylie and her husband, Jason Kelce, share daughters Wyatt, 5, Elliotte, 4, and Bennet, 2, and are currently expecting their fourth.

One thing the two women have in common is being girl moms, something Michelle joked is karma for their husbands. “That’s what I told Barack. The karma was like, ‘Dude, you need a bunch of women in your life to smack you around,” she stated.

Kylie, for her part, noted that she recently read a report that girl dads allegedly live longer than other dads. “I was like, ‘Of course they do,’” she stated. “They have women being like, ‘Are you serious right now? What are you doing? Are you OK? Get it together.’ He now has five of us.”

Michelle told Kylie that just like their conversation about parenthood, “[Jason] and Barack need to talk.”

Earlier in the episode, Michelle recalled that she only began to feel like “an adult that knows something” after the death of her mother, Marian Robinson, in May 2024. “When you lose your parent, you’re always kind of wondering, ‘What on earth do I know? My mom is not here anymore,’” she explained.

The topic of adulting is something Michelle said she talks to her daughters about now that they’re all grown up. “They’re living on their own, if you can believe that, going from these little girls that people saw on the stage at the first inauguration. They’re grown women in the world,” she shared. “But a lot of our conversation now is like, ‘When do you feel like an adult? When does it happen?’ They think like, ‘Is there the magic switch that makes you say, yeah, I’m adulting?’ And I was like, ‘No.’”

Michelle went on to reveal that she experienced motherhood doubt after giving birth for the first time. “When you leave the hospital with that baby, you think, ‘Are you guys for real? You’re letting us, me and this guy, you’re gonna let us get in the car with this precious baby?’” she said. “I think the sadness or the postpartum that I felt with my kids really came from, like, you love these babies so much, immediately you’re connected, and you think, ‘Oh, my God, all you have is me. I feel so bad for you. I wish you had a parent. You deserve more because I don’t know anything and now I’m in charge.’”

Kylie stated that the former First Lady’s comments sounded like “my inner dialogue.”