«I’m not sure what she’s done but I’m told there’s no Ambien or whiskey involved,» Anderson Cooper jokes of his nanny for son Wyatt, 3 months
By Jen Juneau
Anderson Cooper is singing his nanny’s praises.
The CNN anchor recently chatted with WSJ. magazine about his 3-month-old son Wyatt Morgan‘s enviable sleep schedule — 12 hours a night! — and how he owes it all to his baby boy’s «amazing» caretaker.
«I have an amazing nurse … I’m not sure what she’s done but I’m told there’s no Ambien or whiskey involved,» Cooper, 53, joked to the magazine.
The new dad explains that he «used to be a late riser» since he works nights. But since Wyatt’s arrival via surrogate in late April, he «pretty much wake(s) up at 7» and doesn’t even have to use an alarm, because he’s so used to it now.
«My whole motivation in the morning is to be there when my son wakes up because it is the greatest moment of my day,» Cooper reveals. «He sleeps in this sleep sack, which I didn’t know was a thing, and he makes all these great sounds and he stretches and when he finally wakes up and sees you and smiles … it’s incredible.»
Something that has helped the new dad keep his priorities in line is making lists — a practice that he has been working on perfecting as of late.
«I have an ongoing list,» Cooper says. «I was recently advised to order it and that has been a huge help to me. Someone suggested — it seems like such an obvious thing — to order it as ‘important/urgent,’ ‘important/not urgent’ and then just ‘to do.’ «
«I try to knock off two or three things on the list right away,» he adds. «Like on [this]Monday, I’d arranged to have a FaceTime with the interns on my show because they’re working remotely like everybody else, that was on my list.»
«And then there’s things I want to order for Wyatt, and I’m trying to go through all my [late mother Gloria Vanderbilt]’s stuff,» Cooper continues. «I’m ordering filing systems and archival stuff to put photographs in.»
And despite his son sleeping through the night, the Anderson Cooper 360° host has become a fan of a beverage many busy parents feel at times that they can’t live without: coffee.
«As soon as I’ve seen my son wake up and I feed him, I usually wait until he goes back to sleep. He wakes up around 8:15 and by 10 he’s ready for another little nap. As soon as he goes down, I run and get an iced coffee and I cannot tell you the degree to which I look forward to that,» Cooper says.
«I never really drank coffee until my son. It’s amazing,» he adds. «I now understand coffee, although I do think it’s basically just a narcotic. And we’ve all just accepted that, ‘Oh yeah, coffee’s not a drug, it’s just a drink.’ No, it’s not, it’s a drug. But everyone seems to think it’s okay, it’s legal.»
In the meantime, fatherhood has «changed everything» for Cooper: «I’ve often in my life felt like I was waiting for my actual life to begin — it’s obviously ridiculous because I’m 53 years old — but … I’ve been very focused on getting to some place, getting a story. Because I’m focused on [Wyatt], it gives an order to everything.»
Source: People
