Cheryl has praised her ex Liam Payne as the "only man who never cheated on her", and she's always spoken highly of him even after their split. The pair first sparked romance rumours in 2016, following Cheryl's surprising divorce from Jean-Bernard Fernandez-Versini.
In 2017, they were overjoyed to welcome their son Bear into the world. Sadly, less than a year later, Cheryl and Liam announced their separation, yet they've maintained a positive front for their son's sake.
Reflecting on her past heartaches, including her former husband Ashley Cole's infidelities, Cheryl revealed in a 2018 interview that Liam was the only partner who remained loyal. Speaking with The Sunday Times' Style magazine, she expressed that the ex-One Direction member "is the only man who has ever been faithful".
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READ MORE: Liam Payne's relationship with Cheryl and family life with 7-year-old son Bear
Despite their friendly parting, Cheryl found solace in their son, calling him the "man of her dreams" and declaring herself content and complete. "I'm not looking for anything any more. I'm whole. I've got the man of my dreams," she beamed.
When rumours swirled about Liam's fidelity post-breakup, he courageously clarified that their decision to part ways was due to his challenges with fatherhood, not infidelity, reports the Mirror.
The singer became a father for the first time at 23 and admitted that the pressure of parenthood "messed me up". In a candid chat on the Ant Middleton and Liam Payne: Straight Talking documentary in 2019, he confessed that becoming a dad at such a young age was a "difficult thing", and it led him to overthink his responsibilities.
"And I think I built fatherhood up so much in my head that it kind of messed me up to start with. I started in a bad place with it," he continued. "I think it spooked me out early on, and I was just worried I would not be enough to look after the both of them," Liam added.
He later confessed that he "didn't understand" what Cheryl, his then-partner and mother of his child, was going through as she suffered a serious haemorrhage following Bear's birth, and took a break from the limelight to focus on their new baby. Despite their breakup, Liam had nothing but praise for Cheryl, calling her "the best mum in the world ".
"I couldn't ask for someone better," he said on Logan Paul's podcast Impulsive. "The relationship we have now as friends has only grown more."
Cheryl reciprocated her ex's sentiments, telling the Daily Mail in 2019 that she and Liam are successfully co-parenting Bear, and she couldn't be happier about the positive impact it was having on their son.
Cheryl opened up about the split, saying, "There's no animosity whatsoever. We are learning all the time. And it's good, it's healthy. We're just like any other couple that have gone through this, but we have a few more eyes watching us...just a few,"
The singer has kept a respectful silence about Liam lately, which led many One Direction fans to believe that she's protecting her ex for the benefit of their son Bear.
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