Special moments. 

Former Bachelor Nick Viall found love off-screen with wife Natalie Joy and the two welcomed their daughter River Rose Viall last year. 

Now, the Bachelor Nation star is reflecting on life as a dad and how he connects with his daughter. 

In a new video online, he said, “I gotta say, I’m really enjoying my moments as a dad lately because River’s starting to connect with people outside of her mom… She’s been connected with Natalie from the beginning. It’s beautiful, I love it. And as a dad, I’ve had to wait for that moment, right? And so what I wanted is to find my thing with River that she connected with me.”

Nick went on and shared that to help connect with his daughter, he’s become the person who usually puts her to bed. 

He said, “That’s why in the middle of the night, I tend to be the one to go up and get her. I put her to bed most nights because I wanted to be that calming presence and that’s something we started doing. Especially early on, Natalie and I just kind of alternated, but as River got older and was in her crib, I tended to be the one to put her down.”

Nick described the moment he realized he really connected with River was when his mom was visiting and tried putting her to bed herself. 

“My parents were visiting and so I was like, ‘Oh, mom, do you wanna maybe put River down just to spend some time with her before you leave?’ And my mom was like, ‘Sure!’” he shared. “And River started crying and crying and crying and she was throwing a fit with my mom. And finally I was like, ‘All right, I’ll help her out.’ And River just threw herself at me and she goes, ‘Hi, Dadda.’ And it was like the best moment ever and it really was like, ‘Finally, now I’m connecting with my daughter.’”

Nick also explained how in that moment, he suddenly realized how quickly River is growing up. 

He expressed, “I’m lying there with her, she’s going to sleep, and it kind of made me sad because when you have a child for the first time, every parent will say, ‘Oh, my gosh, this is so great. It goes by fast.’ You know it goes by fast, but everyone’s telling you that and when you hear the same thing over and over, you’re like, ‘Yeah, I get it, it goes by fast.’

“But it really made me sad when River was like, ‘Hi Dadda,’ because it made me think like, that ‘Hi Dadda,’ the way she said it in that moment, she’ll never say it like that again. Because she is changing so fast and it was like, ‘I’m never going to let anyone else put my daughter to bed other than me if I can help it.’” 

Nick wrote that he’s “Cherishing every moment of fatherhood” in his caption, and followers filled the comments with how touched they were by the video.