Barack Obama is getting candid about his relationship with his wife Michelle Obama … and revealing some of their marital challenges.

The former president was talking to students at Hamilton College on Thursday when he told the crowd he “was in a deep deficit with my wife” after 8 years in the White House.

Barack added … “I have been trying to dig myself out of that hole by doing occasionally fun things.”

Obama pulled back the curtain on his marriage with Michelle while answering a question from Hamilton College’s President Steven Tepper, who asked what Barack had been up to lately.

Barry says most of his time goes to his Obama Foundation and  is finishing the second half of his presidential memoirs … which he joked was “like 50 term papers.”

The Obamas have been married since 1992 … but they haven’t been spotted out together a lot this year, despite Barack claiming he’s trying to do fun stuff with Michelle.

In March alone, we saw Barack at a Los Angeles Clippers game and out to dinner in L.A. without Michelle … and she wasn’t with him at Jimmy Carter‘s funeral or Donald Trump‘s 2025 Inauguration.