Blue Bloods star Vanessa Ray revealed this week that she and her husband Landon Beard adopted their first child, a baby boy, late last year.
The actress, 42, told PEOPLE on Thursday that their son Isaac Ray Beard was born on November 7th and that the adoption was a ‘whirlwind’ for the couple.
She said that her co-star Peter Hermann ‘graciously’ helped walk them through the process as he and his wife Mariska Hargitay have two adopted children of their own.
After finding an attorney and preparing paperwork for a year, Ray and Beard were matched with Isaac’s birth mother just four weeks before she was due to give birth.
‘He kind of came into our life, it was quite a whirlwind,’ she gushed.
Ray explained that her and Beard — who wed in 2015 — initially ‘weren’t totally sure if we were going to have kids’ or if it made sense for them.
But that all changed when an ‘overwhelming sensation of family’ came over her on the set of the CBS drama.
‘I was at work one day, honestly I was about to do a family dinner and I just had this overwhelming sensation of family and what I love about our life and all of these things,’ she recalled.
She then phoned Beard in tears and told him: ‘I think we’re supposed to be parents and I think we’re supposed to adopt.’
Ray confided in her co-star Bridget Moynahan about their decision to adopt and that the actress told her to reach out to Hermann, who had a guest role on Blue Bloods.
Ray had yet to work with Hermann but that didn’t stop the actor from giving the couple some guidance.
Hermann and Hargitay adopted two out of their three children.
The couple adopted daughter Amaya, now 12, in April 2011 and their son Andrew, now 12, in October 2011. They also share biological son August, 17.
Ray recalled how Hermann ‘really held our hand and walked us through everything that we would need to know about adoption.’
