Anderson Cooper surprised his fans back in April when he announced on CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360° that he had become a father for the first time at the age of 53. Cooper welcomed his son, Wyatt Morgan, via surrogate on April 27, and in a new interview he says that becoming a dad is his “dream come true.”

Speaking with People magazine for their first-ever “Pride Issue,” Cooper discussed his life as the parent of a newborn. And, he also explained why he chose to co-parent baby Wyatt with his former partner, Benjamin Maisani.

“When I was 12 years old and 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,’” said Cooper. “This is a dream come true. It feels like my life has actually begun. And I sort of wonder, what was I waiting for? This is a new level of love. It’s unlike anything I’ve experienced, and yet it’s also very familiar and incredibly special and intimate. It’s really extraordinary.”

Cooper says that he now feels invested in the future in a way that he hadn’t before, and there is something about having a child that makes you feel connected to what is happening in the world. He’s been working from home amid the Coronavirus pandemic and the George Floyd protests, and he says that now that he’s a dad he wants to make sure that the world Wyatt is growing up in is a better one.

“You suddenly worry much more about the future of all of us,” said Cooper.

He admits that he is more tired right now than he has ever been in his life, but he wouldn’t change it for the world. Cooper also revealed that he is more emotional than ever, and he cries at things he has never cried at before.

Anderson Cooper Opens Up About Being a Dad to Baby Wyatt: ‘This Is a New Level of Love’

— People (@people) June 9, 2020

Cooper says that Maisani also gets “weepy” with Wyatt after never seeing him cry during their ten-year relationship. The CNN anchor says it is a “lovely thing” to be overwhelmed with emotion.

Cooper says that even though he and Maisani split in 2018, there is no acrimony between them. He understands it might seem unconventional to co-parent together, but Maisani is family to Cooper. The broadcaster knows what it’s like to grow up without a dad (his father, Wyatt Emory Cooper, died during heart surgery when Anderson was 10), and if something ever happens to him, he wants his son to be “surrounded by love.”

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The former couple is planning to raise Wyatt in Cooper’s four-story converted firehouse in New York City. Anderson Cooper knows he is blessed to be a dad, and he thanked all of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer people who struggled for generations, especially those who died never thinking it was a possibility to have a family of their own.