(CNN) — Former First Lady Michelle Obama says she suffers from “low-grade depression.” The reasons? The pandemic, race relations in U.S and the fight politics surrounding her, she says.
“I’m waking up in the middle of the night because I’m worried about something or because of heaviness,” Obama said on “Michelle Obama’s podcast” this Wednesday. “I try to make sure I train, although there have been periods during this quarantine when I have felt too low spirits.”
It is a familiar feeling for many Americans.
A Census Bureau Survey found that one in three Americans reports symptoms of depression or anxiety, more than three times the rate of a similar survey conducted in the first half of 2019. And as one of the best ways to combat the coronavirus It is through social distancing that people have spent long periods of time without seeing friends or family, exacerbating the already widespread problem of loneliness, which can be profoundly detrimental to mental health.
In his podcast, Obama also spoke about racial reckoning in the United States after the George Floyd’s death this summer. He explained that it is “exhausting” to be “waking up to another story of a black man or a black person who is somehow dehumanized, injured, murdered, or falsely accused of something.”
He also discussed his frustration with people who refuse to wear masks. “There is almost a limit to our sacrifice and it was around a month and then we got tired of the virus,” he said. “It has been discouraging to see so many people who have grown tired of staying home because the virus did not affect them.”
Obama emphasized that while “before we have gone through difficult times in this nation”, “we are at a unique moment in history … We are living something that no one in our lives has experienced.”
Since leaving the White House, Obama has carried out multiple projects, including the publication of his memoirs, a best-seller, and the launch of a series of documentaries on Netfix. His Spotify podcast is his latest creative adventure, focused on “meaningful relationships and conversations.”
Her first guest was her husband, Barack, and upcoming voices will include her mother and brother, nighttime host Conan O’Brien, and Obama’s White House chief adviser, Valerie Jarrett.
– CNN’s Caroline Kelly and Kate Bennett contributed to this story.
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