Kelly McCreary and her husband Pete Chatmon have welcomed their first child, Indigo Wren Chatmon.
According to an exclusive with People magazine, McCreary, 40, gushed while talking about the birth of their new daughter, who arrived “several weeks” early than her due date, the emotional aspects surrounding motherhood, and prepping for the midseason finale of Grey’s Anatomy.
“We had planned a lovely, intimate home birth, but my bag of waters broke several weeks early, so I wound up delivering in the hospital,” says McCreary, who gave birth to her baby Indigo on Sunday, Oct. 3 in Los Angeles.
“Like many birthing people, about the only thing that went according to our birth plan was that the baby came out! I was just so relieved that we both made it through safely. Indigo had to spend some time in the NICU to finish cooking, but fortunately, there were no other complications. She is home and healthy!” she adds.
“As stressful as it was to have Indigo in the NICU, it also meant we had a lot of parenting support in the early days,” the actress says. “We were able to enter into parenthood with a little more sleep and a lot more knowledge than we might have otherwise had thanks to the incredible medical professionals at Cedars Sinai.”
“Emotionally, it has been a roller coaster, of course. Mostly highs, but also many moments of self-doubt and worry and guilt,” she continues. “I am grateful for an incredibly supportive family and community and so lucky to have several close friends who are also new moms and are sharing this journey with me. I want to model wellness and mindfulness for Indigo, so I’m also integrating as much of those practices back into our schedule as I can, which is good for us both.”
After revealing she and her husband were expecting their first child together in August, McCreary shared exclusive photos and a photo of her positive pregnancy test with People Magazine.
“We are really excited to share that my husband and I are expecting our first little one,” McCreary told the outlet at the time.
While the actress and her director husband met on the set of Grey’s Anatomy and married in 2019, the couple knew that they wanted children together but waited for the right time to start a family. However, things don’t always go as planned. McCreary said she was surprised when her Clearblue digital pregnancy test revealed she would become a mom, People magazine reported.
“I actually screamed in shock when I saw pregnant. I mean, I just wasn’t expecting it,” the actress said.
“I had really been mentally and emotionally preparing myself for the possibility that it might take us some time to conceive. So, I was genuinely shocked.”
The new mother gushed while sharing all of the joyous moments she and Indi — the nickname she gave to her daughter — have shared while navigating through motherhood.
“Breastfeeding her makes me feel like superwoman,” McCreary told People magazine. “Watching all the cute faces she makes as she sleeps, seeing how much joy her very existence brings to the whole family, and all of our friends, even the Grey’s crew — it’s such a profound reminder of how much each of us matter just by being here, and that we are not made lovable by the superficial identifiers we attach to ourselves.”
Transitioning back into work mode is often difficult for new mothers. However, McCreary said she’s happy to return to work and has received plenty of love and support from her costars and the crew.
“I went back to work in time to shoot the midseason finale,” she says. “Everyone at the show and Shondaland had been so incredibly supportive and put no pressure on me, and they made it possible for me to ease my way back in gently.”
McCreary appeared in the midseason finale of Grey’s Anatomy on Thursday on ABC.
