Celebrity Parents

BET Show Co-Stars Welcome Baby Together

KJ Smith and Skyh Black are proud and happy first-time parents. The BET stars, who both have worked on Tyler Perry productions, recently announced the birth of their newborn daughter, Pryde JaNea Black.

Baby Pryde was born on Saturday, Oct. 4 at 5 p.m., weighing 5 lbs., 11 oz. and measuring 19.5 inches long. The couple shared the exclusive news via a photoshoot with PEOPLE.  “I wake up every day and I’m just like, ‘I have a little being that is here,’ ” KJ tells the publication. “She looks like a little angel. She’s so precious.”

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Skyh shared that he’s “definitely wrapped around her finger.” He added: “I get up. I walk around for three hours if she wants me to,” the new dad gushed. “My gym workouts are a little bit longer because [I’m] staring at her videos that her mom sends me. She’s perfect, man. She’s so perfect.”

Their birth plan didnโ€™t go as they wished. Initially, they wanted a home birth surrounded by all of their close family and friends. But a long labor, 48 hours in, the plan switched. “I don’t think our midwife was equipped with how she handled my wife’s birth,” Skyh said. “There were certain things that were done that I personally as a husband and a father don’t feel that had my wife’s best interest at heart.”

“That was the hardest day of my life,” KJ explained. “It was really hard because … I was so dead set on having a natural birth, and I just knew it was going to work for me. It worked for so many people and I was like painfully optimistic.”

Everything was set up for the homebirth, but she was in severe pain. A quick call to boss Perry proved to be a gamechanger. Despite filming his next project out of the country, Perry answered on the first ring.

“His first question was, ‘What’s wrong?,’ [and] his next question was, ‘Where is Skyh?’ ” KJ recalls. “I just hand Skyh the phone, and all I know is in the next minute. My whole familyโ€ฆis scrambling.”

Thanks to Perry, the couple were able to get a private room at Northside Hospital Atlanta. KJ underwent an emergency c-section to delivery baby Pryde. Skyh says he is forever indebted to Perry for stepping in and taking action, as things could have gone awry. KJ wasnโ€™t in the delivery room for his babyโ€™s birth, but he says the moment he held her, everything made sense. The couple says the unexpected delivery taught them a major lesson on pivoting, which is necessary in parenting.ย