It is easy for a public image to become something other people start defining for you, especially when fame arrives while you are still figuring out who you are. During a new appearance on Michelle Obama and Craig Robinson’s IMO podcast, Megan Thee Stallion spoke about that pressure through the lens of women’s empowerment, saying women can sometimes “let other people build your personality” before they have fully established it for themselves.
That tension runs through much of the conversation. The confidence attached to Megan Thee Stallion has become inseparable from her career, but she described living inside that image as far less steady than it looks from the outside. She said that those moments also force her to recognize how much she has to be grateful for. Across the interview, that push and pull surfaced repeatedly as she looked back at the family that raised her, the grief she had to navigate in public, and the business lessons that changed how she approaches her career. She also offered an early look at what comes next musically, including the return of Tina Snow for her still-developing Megan: Act III era.
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1. “Being Me, It’s a Rollercoaster”
The version of Megan that audiences see is often built around confidence, but she made clear that confidence does not cancel out exhaustion. There are days she feels fully in control, but sometimes, the constant attention becomes something she wants to escape completely.
“Being me, it’s a rollercoaster. Like, some days I feel like, ‘Yes, hell yeah.’ But then some days, I feel like I need to go get under my bed. I don’t want to see anybody. I don’t want anybody to see me. I’m so tired. I’m tired of people talking about me, I’m just tired.” She said those moments often require her to pull herself out of that headspace by remembering the position she is in and the opportunities her career has given her. “But then, I have to take a step back and realize I’m very blessed.”
2. The Houston Family That Made Megan
Home came up often as Megan talked about the people who raised her before music became a career. Growing up on Houston’s Southside, she spent her earliest years in a household led largely by women while her father was incarcerated. Her mother and grandmothers were central during that period, and Megan described being surrounded by women who helped form the confidence she would later carry into adulthood.
Her relationship with her father became equally important once he was released. Megan said she became best friends with both of her parents and spoke warmly about how her father encouraged her when she was still young. She remembered him as someone who “spoke life” into her and made sure she understood her own value. He died when she was 14, leaving another major loss in a childhood that had already required her to grow up quickly.
Music was already close to home through her mother, Holly Thomas, who rapped under the name Holly-Wood. The name Megan Thee Stallion came before the recording career. She said she changed her social media name in ninth grade, years before she seriously pursued Rap. By 18, she had decided she wanted to start making music herself. What began as teenage personality eventually became the identity she would build an entire career around.
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3. Grieving Her Mother While Still Having To Be Megan Thee Stallion
There was little room to disappear when Megan lost her mother in 2019. Her career was accelerating, and the public version of Megan Thee Stallion still had to show up even while she was trying to understand what grief looked like for herself.
“When my mom passed away, I immediately still had to be Megan Thee Stallion,” she shared. “And so I’m literally trying to figure out how to grieve, how to perform, how to go through everything I’m going through and still do it in front of everybody.”
She said that experience eventually changed the way she handles pain. Instead of forcing herself past it, Megan now tries to let the feeling run its course. “So I’ve learned to just feel what I’m feeling. And just feel it. If it’s pain, if it’s sadness, I have to express it. I might get under my bed and cry. I don’t know, but I have to feel it because I’m never going to be able to come out of it if I don’t get it out of my system.”
4. There Was A Point When Megan Didn’t Want To Be Seen At All
Public attention eventually became something she wanted almost no part of. Megan said there was a period when even ordinary outings felt exhausting because she knew cameras could be waiting anywhere. “It was a point in life when I didn’t want to do anything. I didn’t want to go anywhere, I don’t want to be filmed eating. I don’t want to be filmed getting coffee, I don’t want to be filmed talking to people. Like, just bye, I’m not going outside.”
She described spending long stretches shut away at home, calling herself “a vampire in my room in the dark all the time” until work required her to step back into public view. “I was not in a good space,” she said. “I didn’t want to do anything…be seen…to talk to nobody until I had to turn into Megan Thee Stallion.”
What has changed, she said, is that she is beginning to enjoy parts of her life again without feeling as though every appearance has to be work. “But now I’m doing more Megan things. I feel better. I feel a little less heavy.”
5. The Bad Deals That Changed How She Does Business
Control became a much bigger priority after Megan learned what it felt like to sign an agreement without fully understanding how much power she was giving away. She recalled early deals that left her feeling as though someone else could dictate the direction of her career.
“Somebody talking to you crazy, telling you what you can and can’t put out. I just wasn’t having fun,” she said. “Like, if this is what music is turning into, I don’t want to do it.” Once she was able to leave that situation, Megan said she became determined not to find herself there again. “I don’t ever want to be in a position where it feels like someone has their foot on my neck.”
Her relationship with Roc Nation helped change how she approached the business behind her music. Megan specifically credited CEO Desiree Perez with taking her under her wing and teaching her to think more seriously about ownership. That included understanding the value of controlling her brands and securing trademarks rather than treating those decisions as something separate from being an artist. Perez has served as Roc Nation’s CEO since 2019.
That education eventually showed up in the structure of Megan’s career. Her 2024 agreement with Warner Music Group allows her to release music independently through Hot Girl Productions while retaining ownership of her masters and publishing. She also maintains creative control under the arrangement.
6. Tina Snow Is Grown Now
The next version of Megan’s music is looking backward in one specific way. She said Megan: Act III will bring Tina Snow back into focus, though she is still working on the project’s final title. Rather than treating the alter ego as a nostalgia move, Megan wants to reintroduce her to fans who may not have been around during the earlier mixtape era.
“I think giving her a proper rollout, a proper title, [and] a reintroduction to Hotties that may not have been with me since 2017, 2018. I think that this is gonna be a new experience for them,” Megan explained. “Tina is grown now, babe. She has been through lots of life since y’all heard from her last.”
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She also teased a guest list that sounds considerably broader than a standard Rap feature run. “I have so many collaborations that I feel like the Hotties have been asking me for, from niche collaborations to just personal interest amongst me and the Hotties,” she said. Megan promised some pairings that are “overdue,” and others she believes will genuinely surprise people, though she stopped short of naming names.
The process behind the album may be just as different as the character returning with it. Megan said she went home and shut everything else out so she could concentrate on finishing the record. “For ACT III, I went home, and I was like, ‘Nobody bother me. I gotta finish my album,’” she said. “So, this has been the most organized and the most calm I’ve been making music in a while.”
That calm feels notable after everything else she described in the interview. Tina Snow may be coming back with more experience behind her, but Megan sounds less interested in recreating 2018 than in showing what that persona looks like after everything that followed.
