“Any time you lose a loved one, especially when you’re younger, it alters the trajectory of your life,” Anderson, 54, says in this week’s PEOPLE cover story.
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Ben Watts
Carter died after jumping off the terrace wall of hismother Gloria Vanderbilt’s 14th floor Manhattan apartment. His passing came 10 years after the death of Carter and Anderson’s father, Wyatt Emory Cooper.
Anderson Cooper’s family.Ron Galella/Getty
Cooper brothers.Courtesy Anderson cooper
In his new book (co-written with historian and novelist Katherine Howe)Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty(available Sept. 21), Anderson dives deep into the past to tell the incredible story of how his Vanderbilt family ancestors were once among the richest people in the world before losing it all.
Michael Kovac/Getty
He also sits down with PEOPLE to share what he’s learned about love and loss from his famous family and how he’s raising his 16-month-old son Wyatt, whom Anderson is co-parenting with his former partner of 10 years,Benjamin Maisani, 48.
Anderson Cooper’s family.Susan Wood/Getty
Anderson Cooper’s family.Jack Robinson/Hulton Archive/Getty
“My dad wrote a book before he died (during heart surgery when Anderson was 10) about his family growing up in Mississippi. And because he died when I was so young, a lot that I know of him came from that book. I wanted to write a letter to Wyatt about this crazy and unusual part of his family’s past,” he says.
Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynastyis available Sept. 21.
If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255), text “STRENGTH” to the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 or go tosuicidepreventionlifeline.org.
source: people.com
