CLEVELAND, Ohio -- How is Stipe Miocic spending his first full day back home -- also his 37th birthday -- after winning the UFC Heavyweight Championship over the weekend?

"He's currently napping," says Ryan Marie Miocic, his wife of three years. "He's exhausted. He's napping with the baby. They're sound asleep."

It’s been a whirlwind 48 hours for the family -- daughter Meelah is one-year-old -- since Stipe reclaimed the belt in a thrilling rematch against Daniel Cormier at UFC 241 in Anaheim on Saturday. The post-fight celebration in the ring was followed by a big party and then a long early-morning flight back to Cleveland, where a pile of unpacked boxes with their names on them sits in the family’s new house.

“It’s a madhouse. It’s crazy. I need a vacation,” Ryan says, laughing as we catch up over the phone Monday. “Just insane. I told him today it takes a village. Our’s is like a three-ring circus, but it’s a good one.”

Ryan says the family will spend the immediate aftermath of the victory “just chilling, soaking it in, thanking God and living in the moment” before easing back into real life. That includes spending quality time together as a family as Stipe gets a break from the intense training of the last three months. Meelah, after all, recently celebrated a milestone of her own: learning to walk.

"He's a ball of mush when it comes to her," Ryan says.

Returning to normal life also means going back to work: Ryan is a real estate agent, while Stipe is the most famous part-time firefighter and paramedic perhaps in the world. He’s certainly that at the Oakwood and Valley View fire departments, where he’s worked the last 10 years. His first shift back is next week.

“He enjoys being a fireman. That’s who he is. He loves the guys at the firehouse, they’re brothers,” says his wife, who met Stipe through her brother, an Oakwood firefighter, at the department’s Easter pancake breakfast in 2012. In fact, Stipe, who was reportedly paid $750,000 for UFC 241, loves the job so much he recently applied to become a full-time firefighter with the Valley View Fire Department.

“Hopefully, he’ll get it. There are a lot of candidates,” Ryan says with optimism in her voice.

And New Heavyweight Champion of the World. Stipe Miocic!!!! Proud of our very own to go out and bring his belt back to Ohio! Rest up Stipe. You’re on shift next week 😏 Posted by Valley View Fire Department on Saturday, August 17, 2019

As the wife of an MMA fighter, Ryan, as you might imagine, is relieved the scary part is over, ever thankful just to get her husband back in one piece.

“A million things go through your mind. You think of everything that could happen. This is the father of my child, his health, his safety is number one,” she says when I ask her about what goes through her head during a fight. “The last thing on your mind honestly is a win. You’re just like, get him out of the ring, keep him healthy. Every round that goes on is more torturous than the round before.”

One moment, she's overcome with fear. The next, there's a rush of adrenalin and excitement. Then it repeats itself.

“It changes from round to found. Round one, I knew he was feeling a little out of sorts, trying to find his rhythm. It wasn’t going his way,” she recalls. By round three, she could see her husband finding the zone and thinking, “you got this.”

By the beginning of the fourth and what turned out to be the final round, Ryan says, "I just knew he had it. The second I saw Cormier take that first body shot, I knew that was going to be the end for him. Once Stipe finds his rhythm, he goes into stalk mode and then he starts hunting you. Then there's really no escaping that."

Not that there was ever any doubt in her mind.

“He told me before he went out there, ‘I promise you one thing: I don’t care how it’s got to get done, the belt is coming home with us.’”

Stipe’s prediction came true, of course, with a technical knockout of Cormier, the man who took the belt from him 13 months ago. It was the fifth time, counting three title defenses, Stipe, the Euclid-born native, raised his arms at the end of a match as UFC Heavyweight Champion of the World.

“The first time he did it, it was a shock, like ‘Oh my god, he’s the heavyweight champion of the world,” his wife says. This time, winning wasn’t about holding on to the belt, doing it for his hometown, setting records, or anything else. It was all about Stipe.

"It's not about Daniel Cormier, it's not about the UFC. It's about him," she says.

“He proved to himself what he knew should’ve went down the first time [he faced Cormier]. This was about the legacy he wants to leave for his daughter.”