Who Is Brigitte Macron? French Politician's Wife Used To Be His High School Teacher

France is set to elect a new president Sunday, and with it, a new first spouse. And if that new president is Emmanuel Macron, the country’s first couple will be a rather unconventional one. Macron, 39, is married to his former high school teacher Brigitte Auziere, a woman 24 years his senior.

The two met when Brigitte, now 64, was Macron’s high school drama teacher. Macron was only 15 at the time, while Brigitte was a married mother of three children, one of whom was Macron’s classmate. The couple initially formed a relationship by working together on a rewrite of a play.

“We wrote together every Friday,” Brigitte said in the recent documentary, “Emmanuel Macron— The Strategy of a Star.” “Little by little, I became complete subjugated by the intelligence of this young man. His mind is so full and perfect. His capacities are completely beyond any normal human being’s.”

Macron’s stunned parents requested that Brigitte not have any contact with their son again until he turned 18, though the two continued to keep in touch.

“They spoke for hours on the phone every day,” said Anne Fulda, a French journalist who recently wrote a biography about Macron. “And Emmanuel told Brigitte, ‘I will be back for you. Whatever you do, I will marry you.’”

True to his word, Macron married Brigitte in 2007.

“We were not exactly a normal couple,” Macron said in a speech at his wedding reception. “But you have accepted us and stood by us – and we exist, thanks to you.”

Now married for a decade, Brigitte has reportedly remained indispensable to the presidential candidate, re-reading his speeches and critiquing his performances as well as attending important meetings with him. Their relationship has been high profile, with the two often posing for photos kissing and holding hands at public appearances.

And despite the pair’s unconventional start and large age gap, French voters seem to have little problem with the couple. French tradition looks kindly upon older women dating or marrying younger men, the Telegraph reported. Many have said they found it refreshing to see an older woman with a younger man rather than the other way around.

“Did men ask anybody when they started marrying younger women?” Karen Lewin, a French artist and potential voter, told the Washington Post. “Who sets the rules?”