Growing up, Anderson Cooper worried that he wouldn’t get to experience fatherhood.
“When I was 12 years old and I knew I was gay and thought about my life, it always upset me, because I thought, ‘I will never be able to have a kid,’” Cooper revealed during an interview with People magazine. “This is a dream come true.”
Since welcoming his son, Wyatt Morgan Cooper, on April 27, the CNN news anchor gushed that he feels like his “life has actually just begun” at age 53.
“This is a new level of love,” he declared. “It’s unlike anything I’ve experienced, and yet it’s also very familiar and incredibly special and intimate. It’s really extraordinary.”
Cooper, who has been covering the national Black Lives Matter protests following the tragic death of George Floyd, noted that he feels “invested in the future” in a whole new way.
“There’s something about having a child that makes you feel connected to what is happening and you want to make sure that the world this child is growing up in is a better one,” he explained. “You suddenly worry much more about the future of all of us.”
Cooper’s co-parent and former partner, Benjamin Maisani, is equally besotted with the little boy.
“I cry at things I never cried at before,” Cooper confessed. “And Benjamin, I’ve never seen him cry, but I couldn’t believe how weepy he gets with Wyatt. I find myself being overwhelmed with emotion, and it’s a lovely thing.”
Cooper announced Wyatt’s birth live on-air on April 30.
“On Monday, I became a father,” he said. “I’ve never said that before and it still kind of astonishes me. I am a dad. I have a son and I want you to meet him.”
