What will Melania Trump do now?

Melania Trump is not exactly the easiest person to talk about. On the one hand, this woman has semi-gracefully endured her sentence at the White House but on the other, her lackluster performance as a former First Lady left a lot to be desired. Of course, no one expected the charisma and charm of Michelle Obama, but the complaints, plagiarized speech, and poorly timed White House renovations did not do her any favors either. Still, for all her flaws and drawbacks as a freshly former FLOTUS, Melania Trump stayed by the President, tolerated the lack of privacy, and kept a stoic expression in situations well out of her comfort zone. That’s something difficult to achieve even when you sign up for this kind of situation and are subject to minute media scrutiny.

What will Melania do now? It’s worth wondering how she is going to navigate her life now that she is not the First Lady anymore. We reckon that the former Slovene-American former model could not have predicted the trajectory her life would take in the last four years and yet, nothing could have been worse than those years. At least now she does not have to maintain a facade or do things that she was not good at. Melania Trump is free of the burdens that come with being First Lady and she can go back to the comfort of her private life.

What will Melania do now?

Melania’s portfolio even before she was First Lady has been quite interesting. She is the first First Lady who was born outside the US, the first First Lady who was a former lingerie model and she is shrouded in more mystery than her predecessors. It is practically impossible to identify who she is as an individual and what her interests are. Her identity has always been tied to being Donald Trump’s wife and the media gaze has always been on her as the First Lady. It also does not help that she is not very vocal about herself as an individual. But it is the mystery that makes her a curious entity, compels us to look deeper and speculate more strongly. So what will Melania do now? Here’s a look at the possibilities as there is no concrete confirmation of her decisions..yet.

#1 Continue life with Donald Trump in Florida

This possibility feels the least likely because if we are to take Melania and Donald Trump’s relationship at face value, then we can assume it’s not a loving relationship. Melania might actually be staying with Trump for the sake of their son Baron more than the actual marriage itself. But on the flip side, they’ve been married for 16 years, and if Melania Trump stayed resilient through the last four years, chances are that their relationship might only need a TLC and they might end up being just fine.

#2 Divorce Donald Trump?

There are massive rumors about divorce on the horizon for this former first couple. Especially after Melania’s snub when she left him alone at Palm Beach airport smack dab in front of the cameras. After the January 6 incident, a White House source told CNN that Melania ‘checked out’ mentally and emotionally from everything around her. It is true that Melania remained by the President’s side for four years however the whole experience was so unpleasant and certain parts were so inescapable that the after-effects might show now. With the presidency gone, Melania might just be ready to leverage her revised prenup to end this marriage and divorce her husband.

#3 Melania may reconsider modeling

If the secret recordings from her former best friend and adviser Stephanie Winston Wolkoff are to be believed then MelaniaTrump is yet to put her modeling days behind. Melania expressed annoyances at Beyoncé’s September 2018 vogue cover and appeared to be heavily invested in the way Anna Wintour gave control of the editorial to Beyoncé in the leaked recordings. Melania may still be yearning for her glory days and should she choose to, she can explore options that will help her resume her former career.

#4 Focus on Baron Trump

Barron is undoubtedly the center of Melania’s entire world. She stayed back in New York after Trump’s inauguration so that he could continue his schooling and it’s only natural now for her to focus on Barron’s education till it’s time for him to leave the nest. Now that the Trumps have moved out of the White House, Barron will also be changing schools and going to fancy Pine Crest in Fort Lauderdale which will certainly be an adjustment. So before anything else, Melania will ensure the well-being of her son, and only once things are settled for Barron will she give her attention to other things.
For all her faults and setbacks, the one thing that Melania can and should be commended for is her resilience. For such a private person with a lavish lifestyle in New York to move to the White House and be exposed to politics the way she was, things could have been handled much worse. No matter what Melania may choose to do in the future, she certainly has an illustrious past and a story, the intimate details of which we will know, only if she chooses to reveal them.
Featured Image credit: DoD News, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons