Liam Payne and Cheryl Cole's desperate wish for Bear to protect him at all costs

Liam Payne and Cheryl Tweedy began dating in 2016 before welcoming their beloved son Bear a year later, and continued to amicably co-parent following their split

Liam Payne and Cheryl Tweedy passionately agreed on one decision about their son Bear.

The former X Factor star devastatingly died, aged 31, after falling from the third floor of a boutique hotel in Buenos Aires, Argentina, last month. Today, his heartbroken family and friends are mourning their huge loss and celebrating his life at his private funeral in the Home Counties.

Liam is survived by his loved ones and seven-year-old son Bear, whom he welcomed with ex Cheryl back in 2017, a year before their split. Although their relationship didn't work out, the pair shared a commitment to their son, and were on the same page when it came to posting pictures online.

At an event in 2017, Liam shared how they took "a million pictures" of the youngster, but decided against posting them online. He said: "[Cheryl] has her rest time bonding with Bear at the start. She's an incredible, a natural mum. We take a million pictures of Bear but we want him to be able to decide what he wants to share when he's older."

In a 2023 interview with British Vogue, Cheryl expressed her longing for Bear to have a normal childhood. She said: "I don't want people recognising him on the street. But he's twigged that I'm famous. The other day he said, 'How lucky am I to have famous parents?' I said, 'It doesn't matter'. He goes: "Yeah. But it's pretty cool'."

Liam revealed they had taken steps to protect Bear from the darker aspects of fame in 2021. He told Stephen Bartlett on The Diary Of A CEO podcast: "Obviously, we protected his identity to start off with, and that's not being pretentious or anything other than the fact that I want to give him a chance to be Bear first before he has to be, 'Oh, your mum and dad are so and so' you know. And I made my choice to be where I was at 14 [or] 15, so I figure he can make his own choice then too."

Both Liam and Cheryl chose not to show Bear's face, however, it's understood he looks strikingly like his dad, as detailed by Liam in a 2020 interview with People magazine. He shared: "He looks exactly like me, which is very strange. When family members see baby pictures of me now, they say, "Oh wow, Bear looks really great there!'"

In 2018, a year after Bear's birth, the parents announced their split following two and a half years together, but vowed to remain close to raise their son. A statement read: "We are sad to announce that we are going our separate ways. It's been a tough decision for us to make. We still have so much love for each other as a family. Bear is our world and we ask that you respect his privacy as we navigate our way through this together."

Liam later shared how he still spent a lot of quality time with his son. He said in 2022: "I see him two times a week, three times a week sometimes. And I make sure when I see him, he has 100 percent of my time. I make sure that I'm not on my phone or d***ing around somewhere else. So, I like to give him those moments and it's important, he needs that in his life, he needs his dad in his life, and I'm happy he looks at me like a superhero, and I'm hoping to keep it that way."