Michelle Obama’s brother, Craig Robinson, is happily married to Kelly McCrum, but his divorce from his first wife, Janis Robinson, was incredibly difficult to navigate. Although Craig, who’s one year older than the former first lady, has spoken about his divorce before, he peeled back another layer on the debut episode of his and Obama’s new job, their podcast, “IMO with Michelle Obama and Craig Robinson.” During the segment where they spoke about the times they did and did not lean on each other, Craig cited his 2000 divorce from his first wife as a time when he braved his problems alone.
“And I want to tell a story about when I didn’t lean on you,” Craig began. “Just in this example was when I was going through my first divorce, my only divorce, and I didn’t tell you about it.” He continued, “And the reason I didn’t tell my sister about it, or my mom, or anybody close to me … was because I know my sister, and I said if I tell her about this, she’s never going to get over it.” In his mind, he decided to keep the issues he and Janis faced to himself to help preserve her relationship with his family in case they ever got back together. Ultimately, he held off as long as possible, and when he did finally open up about their issues, “[Michelle] was so mad that I hadn’t told her and so disappointed that I vowed that I would never not tell her — hold anything from you.”
And while Craig didn’t harp on the issues that led to his split from Janis in this episode, he’s spoken about it before at length.
Craig Robinson kept his marital problems from his family
In 2013, Craig Robinson, a former investment banker turned basketball coach, sat down for an interview with Graham Bensinger to dig into his divorce from Janis Robinson. Midway through, Bensinger alluded to substance use on Janis’ part as one of the major factors of their divorce, and Craig didn’t disagree. “Those close to you have made no secret. I mean, it was a bitter divorce … you and I guess your wife, your ex-wife, still don’t talk ’till this day. I guess there was a substance abuse problem. You have custody of the kids,” said the host. In response, Craig revealed that he learned “you can’t ever tell what your situation is going to end up — even if it starts out great. And, umm, you have to be adaptable.”
Craig, who has lived a tragic life, explained again that hoping his marriage would work out kept him from opening up about their problems. “The whole time, I was thinking it might work out,” he said. “I know that if I was sharing all of the bad stuff with my family, they would never get over it. I would get over it, they would never get over it, and I wouldn’t be able to do that to my ex-wife or my wife. If you get into it too much, and you tell them everything, they’ll never forgive your significant other.” He continued, “So that was the reason why, being as close as our family was, they were all shocked that I was getting divorced.” His sister, Michelle Obama, was especially upset that he weathered his trials alone, but he still believed that people shouldn’t share their partner’s dirty laundry with their family.
On their podcast, Obama revealed that she sensed a disconnect going on, but she wasn’t aware of the extent of his issues. “I thought I saw some things that were red flags, but I would always be like, ‘How you doing?’ and your reply would always be, ‘We’re great, we’re good.'” After that, she told Craig never to tell her that things in his life were good because she wouldn’t believe him again.
