Meet Katherine Heigl's 3 Children
Actress Katherine Heigl is probably best known as Dr. Izzie Stevens on "Grey's Anatomy," Tully Hart on "Firefly Lane," or from one of her many romantic comedies, but to her kids, she's just Mom. The actress has undergone quite a transformation in the past decade. Heigl and her husband, Josh Kelley, are the parents of two girls and a boy, Naleigh, Adalaide, and Joshua. In 2009, Heigl and Kelley adopted Naleigh from South Korea, and then in 2012, they adopted Adalaide in the U.S. In 2016, Heigl gave birth to Joshua.
When Heigl met Kelley, she told him how she wanted her future to look and explained that she not only wanted to start a family but wanted to adopt, too. She said, "About six months after meeting my now-husband, I was, like, 'I'd better get a few things straight now: marriage and having a family are both really important to me; starting a family with adoption is also really important to me'" (via People). Katherine Heigl's older sister, Meg, was adopted from South Korea, and she wanted to model a family after the one she grew up in. "I was born into it," said Heigl. "I wanted my family to look like the one I came from."
Naleigh and Adalaide were adopted
Katherine Heigl and Josh Kelley married in 2017, and the couple started their family when they adopted Nancy Leigh (Naleigh) Mi-Eun Kelley in 2009. Naleigh was considered a special needs adoption because she was born with a congenital heart defect. Newborn Naleigh had to undergo major open heart surgery before she could leave South Korea and come home with Heigl and Kelley. "Her heart is 100 percent fine now," Heigl told Harper's Bazaar soon after the surgery. "She has a scar, so she won't be wearing bikinis, which is fine by us."
When it came time for the couple to expand their family in 2012, international adoption had become a more arduous process, so they decided to look into domestic adoption. "My lawyer called and said, 'There's a birth mother, and she's due in four weeks. She's all yours if you want her!' " said Heigl, per Hello! That baby would be their next daughter, Adalaide Marie Hope Kelley.
With Naleigh and Adalaide growing into young women, Heigl says she and Kelley have been honest about how they came to their family. She explained that while they don't have any information about the girls' biological fathers, they know some about their mothers. "If you guys want to talk more about them, you can have as much or as little information as you want," Heigl told her daughters. "Tell us what you're comfortable with knowing.'"
Joshua Jr. is the youngest
In 2016, Katherine Heigl announced that she would soon welcome another child to the family. "The Kelley clan is thrilled to announce that we are expecting a third addition to our family," read a public statement. "Naleigh and Adalaide could not be more excited to welcome their new sibling into the fold, and Josh and I are overflowing with joy and gratitude."
In December of that year, Joshua Bishop Kelley Jr. was born via cesarean section. "My doctor struggled to get him out because he was really wedged in there and not quite ready to leave the womb," She wrote on her Instagram. "When she finally pulled him out at exactly 12:33 p.m., he didn't start breathing, and they worked quickly to get oxygen in him and start his tiny lungs." Now, a grade-schooler, Joshua Jr. is said to be consumed with Spider-Man and the Hulk.
Heigl says she sees the difference between raising girls and boys. She told NewBeauty she could see that people-pleasing affects her daughters even though she knows it's not learned in her home, especially with her oldest, Naleigh. "I keep saying, 'I need you to understand that that is not your job,'" says Heigl. "And I don't know if she'll fully understand it until she's in her 40s and has garnered some experience of wisdom, but I want to keep hammering it home."