The internet is both cure and curse
anything from him; in fact, I know we won’t,” says Black. “That’s not just our instincts, that’s listening to the advice from people born of surrogacy.”
Daley seems much older than his 24 years. It is easy to forget he was only 14, the youngest British athlete at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, when he first made diving headline news. The public fell hard for the puppyeyed boy from Plymouth and his devoted dad, Robert – who cheered his son on around the world before dying of brain cancer in 2011.
Robert’s son now has two Olympic bronze medals and three Commonwealth golds, and still wears the ring of the Olympic rings his parents got him after Beijing, in lieu of the tattoo he really wanted and finally got after London 2012.
With fame, however, came relentless objectification – followed by speculation about his sexuality. In 2013, still mourning his father, Daley came out via a touching YouTube video, in which he revealed he had been in a whirlwind romance with Black for just over six months (“a real love-at-first-sight thing,” they say of their meeting at an LA dinner party).
Becoming a father to Robbie, who is named after his grandfather, has made Daley miss Robert all the more. “My dad taught me so many lessons, and there’s something really special about passing them on to our little son,” he says. “The things that I used to find incredibly embarrassing about how he used to act have taught me not to care what anyone else thinks. I know that our family is built around infinite amounts of love.”
A young dad by today’s standards – “he always likes to be the youngest at everything,” jokes Black – Daley was shopping for baby clothes even before they met.
‘You wouldn’t ask a straight couple: why do you deserve a biological kid?’
“I’ve always wanted kids. It’s always been important. But I never knew what it would feel like for a little baby to stare into your eyes and just… that connection is so strong. You realise that you will literally do anything to protect him, to keep him happy, to make him feel loved.”
Since Robbie’s birth, you would forgive the couple for wanting to shun the media; on the contrary, they are gearing up to make a BBC documentary about surrogacy determined to educate people about how it works, and have become ambassadors for Pampers, as the example of a truly modern family.
“In the work I do, I’ve learned that you have to look at slights as opportunities,” says Black, who is working on a new teen romcom called The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight. “That’s the way we can create progress, so that we can make sure that it doesn’t happen to other folks, gay and straight, who are having to go the extra mile to have the family they dreamed of because of health issues, infertility issues or because they’re same-sex parents.
“People have said things that I believe are ill-informed, and I’d like to correct the record, but then there have been beautiful moments.”
Last week, the couple were walking Robbie’s pram along the South Bank when a Muslim woman in full hijab came up to offer congratulations. “She said: ‘I’m so happy for you’. When people see us together as a family, they see that’s what truly matters,” says Daley, gazing at his tiny son, now snoozing peacefully in his father’s arms.
New father, f Tom Daley Da is the Pampers Pa Pure Partner P and UK Brand Ambassador for the launch of the new Pure Protection range, which is inspired by and d derived from n nature and is a available in st stores now.