On Saturday, Rihanna celebrated International Women’s Day by honoring two very special boys: her sons. In an Instagram post, she shared pics of the now two-year-old RZA and the 19-months-old Riot Rose as infants, just moments after giving birth and being held in their mother’s arms.
“By far the most powerful thing I’ve ever done as a woman…my little miracles! #InternationalWomensDay,” the ANTI singer wrote in the caption. In the first photo, Rihanna can be seen wearing heavy jewelry, including a gold necklace and pearls, as she clutches RZA to her chest. In the second, she wears a black top and a pair of pink sunglasses with Riot Rose curled up against her. Both the boys wore little pink beanies.
“And yes I gave birth in pearls and sunglasses…don’t ask, a lot was happening,” she added.
Rihanna shares her children with rapper A$AP Rocky. The couple got together in 2020, and announced they were expecting for the first time in early 2022, before RZA’s birth in May of that year. She announced her second pregnancy live at the Super Bowl during her 2023 halftime show.
In a cover story for British Vogue in 2023, the Fenty Beauty founder called motherhood “legendary. ”
“It’s everything. You really don’t remember life before—that’s the craziest thing ever,” she explained. “You literally try to remember it—and there are photos of my life before—but the feeling, the desires, the things that you enjoy, everything, you just don’t identify with it because you don’t even allow yourself mentally to get that far. Because it doesn’t matter.”
Of the birthing experience itself, Rihanna said, “Essentially, from one person I became two. You walk into the hospital as a couple and leave as a family of three. It’s nuts. And oh, my gosh, those first days are insane. You don’t sleep. At all. Not even if you wanted to. We came home, cold turkey, had no one. It was just us as parents and our baby. Man, you’re a zombie for the most part.”