During the first campaign, one of my jobs as my husband's spouse was to travel around the country and really listen to women. There were voices that were new to me: the voices of military spouses, many of them women, and veterans.... I was overwhelmed by their challenges, and the notion that we as a country don't even know that these women exist, because we live in a country where one percent of the population protects the rights and freedoms of the other 99 percent of us. I thought that if I had the opportunity to serve as First Lady, I was going to use this platform to be their voice.

Your word is your bond, you do what you say you're going to do.

Barack Obama was always special, you know? And not special, like, He's gonna be important, he's gonna be president. He was special in terms of his honesty, his sincerity, his compassion for other people.

We're [President Barack Obama and I] clear on the fact that we have to stay humble and prayerful. We have to dig down deep to our roots. When things come together, we know some of it is Barack, some of it is us-but a lot of it has nothing to do with either of us.

For me, as a mother, I am just, you know, I just can't put into words how important it is for every American, for every mother, for every person in this country, to have healthcare.

Even my husband is happier when I'm happy. He has always said, "You figure out what you want to do," because he's discovered that personal happiness is connected to everything.

For the first time, the nation will have goals, benchmarks, and measureable outcomes that will help us tackle the childhood obesity epidemic one child, one family, and one community at a time.