Family Success Story The Shattucks
M
eet the Shattuck family—Kelly and Amy, and their children Emma, Jack, Sydney, and Sam of Millard! Kelly is a family law attorney, and Amy is a physical therapist in the Millard Public Schools district. The family has four lovable pets—Dasher, a Bassett Hound, Lily, a mini-Dachshund, Penny, a Yorkie terrier, and Buddy, a cat. “Everyone definitely has their favorite [pet], and they are very much a part of our family,” Amy says. Kelly and Amy have been married for 21 years, and they dated for about five years before they got married. “It seems like we’ve never been without each other,” Amy says. Together, Kelly and Amy are very family-centered in their values, and they often take family votes on big decisions—like when and where to move, where to take vacations, and even what to have for dinner. “Kelly and I are very much aware that our marriage is the foundation of our family, so we take our relationship very seriously. Date night is a big deal that we make a priority, as well as sticking up for each other when the kids gang up on us…It’s not always perfect or pretty, but we really cannot imagine life without each other.” The Shattucks started their family with two biological children—Emma and Jack—that were both tough deliveries and recoveries for Amy, but they still wanted more kids. Instead of attempting for a third biological child, the Shattucks contacted American Adoptions out of Overland Park, Kan., and began the adoption process in June 2003. Amy recalls that Emma sat on Santa’s lap that year and wished for a baby sister for Christmas— and surprisingly enough, they got the call in January. In what Amy describes as “ten very long days later,” she went alone to pick up the family’s new addition, five-week-old baby Sydney, in Maryland. “It’s funny that I talk about what a great team Kelly and I are, but I wanted to pick up Sydney myself,” she says. When Amy saw Sydney for the first time, she bawled. After spending an hour with Sydney’s foster parents while baby Sydney
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Kelly, Amy, Emma, 15, Jack, 13, Sam, 6, and Sydney, 8, Shattuck
slept, Amy finally got to take her daughter home. “I remember being so afraid that she would wake up, be scared, and cry because she didn’t know me,” she says. But Sydney didn’t cry once on the way home. “I talked to her the whole way home, telling her over and over that she was coming home, and that I was her momma— and that I was sorry it took me so long to get her.” Amy and Sydney arrived home around midnight to a very excited family. Amy remembers Emma saying, “Look at her beautiful lips, Mom. Someday, she is going to be a great kisser!” Jack, however, took a little more convincing, as he had wanted a brother; but as soon as they laid Sydney on the bed next to Jack, Sydney smiled at him, and he decided she could stay. “We all stayed home from work and school for the next couple of days to be with her…and we were totally happy with our little brood.” Kelly and Amy were then taken completely by surprise when Amy found out she was pregnant with their third child, Sam. “I’m not sure how I survived the delivery, but Sam has brought us joy and his own unique gifts…Sam has been [Sydney’s] best sidekick.” Amy says life before Sydney was “quiet and boring,” explaining that Sydney is an extrovert in a house of introverts. Although Sydney is described as a confident, happy, social butterfly, Amy says Sydney does get upset sometimes that she is the only adopted child in the family. “She is very open about her adoption and will tell anyone, but every once in a while, she gets very sad that she was not born in my tummy.” And even Amy struggles sometimes with the dynamics of her family when people ask her whether she loves her adopted daughter differently than her biological children. “That always makes me smile at [people’s] ignorance. I love each of my kids differently because they are all such different individuals with their own unique gifts and challenges. I do not love one more than another.” Amy says love is what keeps her family together and successful. “We have lots of it for each other no matter what. Sure, my kids fight like cats and dogs, and it gets loud and crazy at our house on a daily basis; but just before lights out, there are hugs for SPECTRUM each of our unique kids, and they are all right where they belong.”
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