Teyana Taylor Reveals Erykah Badu Will be her Midwife

Teyana Taylor, singer and wife of NBA player Iman Shumpert, recently revealed that they are expecting their second child together. In her video for her single “Wake Up,” she reveals a baby bump towards the end of the visual. The Harlem native said she has enlisted a R&B veteran to be her midwife: Erykah Badu.

During an interview with Nick Cannon for his “Nick Cannon Mornings” show, he asked if she was also going to deliver her second child at home. Taylor unexpectedly gave birth to her four-year-old daughter, Iman Tayla “Junie” Shumpert Jr., in her bathroom, which she revealed on Instagram.

“You know what’s crazy, even though the Junie story is crazy, it kind of put me in a comfort zone where I don’t—I  don’t know if I want to go to the hospital for this next baby,” she said. “I’ma make sure it’s not on the toilet or the bathroom floor. I’m considering home birth and I’m actually going to be doing it with Erykah.”

Taylor joked that she would have Badu serenade her while she is in labor.

“I’m super excited,”Taylor added. “So I’ma have her just sing her verse from ‘Lowkey’ for me to calm my nerves.” 

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Erykah Badu has Been Delivering Babies Since 2001

 

Besides being a Grammy Award-winning artist, Erykah Badu has a gift for delivering children. During an interview on Sway in the Morning (which is above), she revealed she has helped deliver 40 babies. The “The Love of My Life” singer said after she helped her best friend give birth she decided to begin studying midwifery.

“My best friends, two of them – stic.man [of Dead Prez] and his wife Afya – were in labor and I was on a flight and he called me and said that, ‘Afya told me to let you know that she’s in labor.’ And I re-routed my flight – This was in 2001 – to go to be with them here in Brooklyn,” she said. “I just stayed up with her. Her labor was natural, for fifty-two hours. Fifty-two hours  and I stayed up with her. I didn’t get sleepy or anything. I was able to just be there for her, whatever it took – singing, coaching, walking, bouncing, massaging. I had just had my son, a live, natural birth at home as well, so I had a little bit of experience. After that, I felt that well I can do this. I can be the welcoming committee for new spirits coming in. That’s when I decided to start studying for it. I became a doula about five years ago.”

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Iman Shumpert Helped Delivered His First Child With Taylor

When Taylor was pregnant with her first child, she went into labor and had no clue until she felt her daughter’s head. In a post on Instagram, she opened up about the whirlwind birth and how Shumpert, who was her fiance at the time, helped her deliver the baby on their bathroom floor.

“On Dec 16th at 6:42am in our bathroom Junie decided she wanted to take her first breath into this world,” she captioned under a picture of Shumpert and a newborn Junie. “She came out as a wonderful surprise to everyone! Not knowing I was in labor until I felt her head…it took two ten count pushes with my fiancé playing Dr. and she entered this world into his bare hands! Eyes full of tears and barely able to speak to the emergency operator [Iman Shumpert] tied a pair of red headphones around the umbilical cord and the ambulance made there grand entrance 5 min later. She opened her eyes right away, gazed into mine and never cried! He handed her to me wrapped in our bath towel and wiped her face for me to see what LOVE really is.”

They tied the knot in 2016, according to Essence.

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