Ashley Graham Reveals Birth Story and Son’s Name in Podcast Episode

This week’s guest on Ashley Graham’s podcast, “Pretty Big Deal” was pretty special—it was her newborn son! Graham’s actual guest was husband Justin Ervin, but, when the couple introduced baby Isaac Menelik Giovanni Ervin towards the end of the episode, he pretty much stole the show.

Throughout the episode Graham and Ervin discuss their journey to parenthood, including Graham’s birth story. She reveals that she woke up at 5 a.m. the morning of January 18 with contractions, but waited two hours before she woke up Ervin. The couple then began finishing up their house preparations for baby and later went out for breakfast, where Graham ate pancakes in between contractions. But what’s most surprising? Graham then came home and went to her yoga class. Ervin jokes that most people would have canceled the class due to being in labor. Even so, Graham made it through 15 minutes of her class before her water broke. She gave birth to Isaac in a home, water birth a few hours later.

“Seeing you with tears in your eyes and saying ‘I can see his head’ gave me so much strength to just push him out, and I really needed that,” Graham tearfully told Ervin during the interview.

As for baby’s name? The couple revealed that Ervin had picked the name Isaac for his future son a long time ago. Menelik was inspired by the couple’s trip to Ethiopia last Christmas, as it honors the country’s first emperor. Giovanni highlights Ervin’s Italian heritage and the couple’s grandfathers, who were both named John.

“Everything in his name is pointing to legacy, whether it’s Isaac with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob or Menelik being royal African roots and then Giovanni is the Italian version of John,” Ervin shared.

Graham had been a voice of empowerment for women everywhere throughout her pregnancy, and now that baby is finally here, she also shared that she only feels more powerful. “Going through the hardship of my body changing, having to go back to practice what I preach and then going through the invincible laboring birth experience that I did, and now to be able to stand tall and say, ‘Wow, I did it’ — I’m so proud of myself, and I want other women to feel that exact feeling of just being invincible,” she said in the episode. “I feel like there’s nothing I can’t do.”

Congrats to the family of three!