The South African model took to her Instagram account yesterday to share a really intimate Mother’s Day post.
“Possibly sensitive content for some, but the most personal content I’ve ever shared”, Candice Swanepoel said in the post showing a video of her giving birth and breastfeeding her firstborn, Anacã Nicoli.
Anacã was born on October 5, 2016, which means he is now six years old. Candice is also the mother to Ariel Swanepoel Nicoli, born June 19, 2018.
In the vulnerable post, the stunning Victoria’s Secret model-turned-swimwear designer speaks openly about her experience of becoming a mother and how natural birth transformed her life:
“The day I became a mother was the most transformative, euphoric and overwhelming day of my life,” she begins.
“I had been in labor for 16 hours with my midwife and doctor supporting me throughout my pregnancy and now this moment, half the time at home, in and out of a H๏τ shower, then the last 6 hours at a hospital that had a bath where my first son was born. Where I was reborn.”
The 34-year-old model said that she chose to have her children in Brazil, having researched the top-notch medical teams to help her bring her babies into the world. The most important thing, she said, was that there were no drugs or interventions involved, making it a thoroughly natural birth.
“Many people thought I was crazy to want that, Including my family,” she admitted, adding that “I wanted to be fully present in that moment, to feel every ache and wave of the contractions, and welcome my son looking at his eyes letting him know I was THERE. With him. Not only does the mother pᴀss through difficulty to birth but so does the baby, from a warm cozy safe space to this big world..”
She mentioned being brought up on a farm – she was raised in Mooi River, South Africa – which helped her understand “what nature was capable of” after witnessing countless births of cattle, dogs, cats, and even chameleons.
She says that Mother’s Day reminds her of the strength of women, and confessed that “Being a mother is hands down the hardest yet most rewarding job of them all.”
Behold, Candice giving birth and breastfeeding the way nature intended:
Candice has been in and out of the news thanks to her rumoured romantic links with controversial rapper Kanye “Ye” West, although that was squashed when Ye took on a new ‘wife’ Bianca Censori.
In January this year Candice was spotted here in South Africa, enjoying the summer sunflowers with her mother Eileen Swanepoel and what looks like one of her sons at the Vergelegen Wine Estate in Somerset West:
As Candice said, Happy Mother’s Day “to those who are mothers, who have lost mothers and are yet to become mothers”.
