In a rare interview, David Furnish has talked about life as a parent with musician husband Elton John. "It's turned out to be a very healing, positive thing in both our lives," he revealed. Elton is "much more mellow with children" he added.
Talking to *The Sunday Times *yesterday, Furnish spoke of the support the couple received – from friends, family and fans – following their decision to father two sons, Zachary (4) and Elijah (2) via a surrogate mother.
"I'm sure it's not everyone's cup of tea," he said. "All we have found from this massive change in our lives is love and support. And I really mean that. We've not had any negative stuff thrown in our direction, and everything from parents on the school run to teachers in the school to fans has been positive."
This, of course, fails to mention the IVF spat between Elton John and Domenico Dolce (of Dolce and Gabbana) earlier this year. In an interview for Panorama, Dolce had described IVF babies as "synthetic", and John took to Instagram to air his views. "How dare you describe my beauitful children as 'synthetic'?" he wrote, ending his post '#BoycottDolceGabbana'.
A week later however, the megastar announced to a packed audience whilst onstage in Las Vegas that he 'loved' Dolce and Gabbana clothes, which put an end to the rift.
In yesterday's interview, Furnish was not drawn in to comment, but discussed instead how he and John manage fatherhood in and amongst a heavy workload - John spends many weeks a year touring, whilst Furnish heads up the business side of 'Brand Elton'. Furnish replied that John's tour dates and Zachary's school holiday schedule sit "literally side by side".
"We really feel very strongly that the children need to be part of a regular school community," he continued, "not taken out of school and taken round the world on a regular basis."
The high profile couple, who have been together for 22 years, arrived at parenthood considerably late in life (John is 68, Furnish, 53) but Furnish maintained he is glad they waited. "I'm actually very grateful that I've come to parenting when I've come to parenting," he said. "Nothing prepares you for the responsibility and the changes in life... I feel much more comfortable in my skin professionally that I'd have felt 20 years ago."
He concluded: "Financially, our life is in a solid place. In terms of being able to give the children as much focus as you possibly can, those things aren't distractions now. And now, where work is concerned, it's really, really easy. Either it's really good for our business and we want to do it, or turn it down because it means taking time away from the children. That's an easy decision to make."