Brigitte Macron has opened up about life as First Lady of France in a rare interview, admitting she has to work at guarding her privacy because she ‘talks easily’.
Mrs Macron, 68. told the French magazine Madame Figaro that she’s conscious that the First Lady isn’t chosen by the public who have elected the president, and knew she’d have to work to gain their approval.
Referring to her husband, 44, who she first met when she was his teacher, she said she’s structured her life around Emmanuel and her three children, and the couple are strict about maintaining their private life.
The first lady said both she and the French President, right, are extremely protective of their private life (pictured in September 2020 in Lithuania)
‘I have learned not to speak openly to anyone, anywhere and anytime, which took a huge effort from me because I speak easily,’ the First Lady said, adding that anything she says can be repeated and interpreted.
‘The French did not want me [as opposed to her husband, whom they elected], I am perfectly aware of that,’ she added.
Equally Brigitte, who has previously admitted her husband’s decision to run for president in 2017 had been ‘difficult’, said she didn’t choose the direction her life has taken and that it has ‘fallen on her’.
She has since put charity projects related to health, culture and education at the heart of her role.
In a rare interview, Brigitte Macron, 68, told the French magazine Madame Figaro that she is ‘aware’ the French people did not choose to have her as a first lady when her husband, 44, was elected as president in 2017 (pictured in August 2021)
She added that her days are are structured around the president – whom she called Emmanuel in the interview – and her children, but admitted she doesn’t have an ‘ordinary life’, and has had to lear to live with a security detail and not being able to walk her dog, Nemo, when she wants to.
Describing herself as someone ‘good humoured’ who ‘lives in the moment’, the former teacher said that she and her husband are very strict about protecting their private life as much as possible.
Brigitte, who was born Brigitte Trogneux, talked about her childhood as the youngest child of a large family, explaining her parents taught her that respecting others was the most important thing she and her siblings could do.
However, she admitted that since the age of eight, she’s had a keen sense that death can strike at any time – after losing her older sister in a car crash.
She admitted she found being a teacher difficult because she could not bear the mental load after the birth of her third child – her daughter Tiphaine Auzière, who is 38, and five years younger than her husband.
Pressed by the journalist, she said she would call herself a feminist, but added she believes women and men should work together towards parity.
She said she loves men, but wants them to listen more to women, to understand their pleas and to fight with them for equal rights
Macron, speaking at a charity event on January 12. The former teacher said she is aware people did not chose her as their first lady
Talking of the younger generation of female activists, she said she can understand that young people are not satisfied with the world and want to change it, especially went it comes to the environment and relations between the two genders.
This interview comes months after a tell-all book lifted the veil on the relationship between Brigitte Macron and her husband.
French journalist Gaël Tchakaloff, 49, who has been friends with the Macrons since 2016, followed them closely for a year and a half before penning Tant Qu’on Est Tous les Deux (As Long as We’re Together), a biography which was published in France last week.
The book, which was not formally authorised but includes quotes from Brigitte Macron, 68, herself, as well as associates of the French president, 43, and his wife, portrays the couple as a close-knit unit who scarcely do anything without the other knowing.
Tchakaloff, who said in the book she was ‘fascinated’ by the Macron love story, revealed the French president calls his wife every hour and a half.
Meanwhile, anonymous sources close to the couple opened to Tchakaloff about Emmanuel and Brigitte’s bond, with one calling the First Lady ‘dedicated to her husband’s success,’ and reminiscing about their very ostentatious public displays of affections in the early days of their romance, when Macron was at university.
The president’s mother, Francoise Nogues, also spoke exclusively with the author about her close friendship with Brigitte.
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