Baby Carter Cookson was laid to rest today after his heartbroken dad carried the tiny coffin at his funeral.
The little boy was born prematurely on Boxing Day and his parents Sarah Cookson and her husband, Chris, had desperately tried to find a new heart for him.
But despite their efforts, the youngster sadly died at Newcastle’s Freeman Hospital on January 19 before a donor organ could be found.
The couple, from South Shields, Tyneside, had already been through the heartbreak of losing their first child, Charlie, aged two in 2013.
Devastated family and friends gathered to say goodbye today with photographs and blue flowers in the shape of a teddy bear and spelling out his name surrounding the little white coffin.
One message read: "Our beautiful nephew Carter, you have left a huge hole in all of our hearts".
Last week Sarah took to Facebook and said the loss of both boys was "killing us both" and had left her "filled with pain".
She also described how she was yet to face Carter’s nursery.
The 44-year-old wrote: "Yesterday we came home without our baby boy…. after being admitted to the RVI [Royal Victoria Infirmary] on Xmas Eve… I kept telling myself, it’s fine… he is going to be fine, I will do as I am told… rest up in hospital…it was almost time… we were going to be a family again with our Angel watching over us.
"Then we spent 25 days… in hell.. a hell we feel we will never leave. Today when we woke after battling with our hearts and minds to get a couple hours sleep.. I wanted it to be a nightmare.
"So many tears… I am still to face and open the door of his nursery… The pain is unbearable."
She added: "To stand at his brother’s grave side in sheer disbelief that this is reality.. very shortly his little brother will be joining him…. So many whys!!!!????? So very very wrong.. we only wanted to be normal, we would of loved to just have night feeds… bath time… walks pushing him in his pram. BUT once again…. we are suffering."
Sarah said she and Chris, 40, spent time with Carter in the chapel of rest, cradling his body, after visiting his big brother’s grave.
"It is killing us both… my whole body feels like it is hollow and then been filled with pain," the mum added in her post.
The couple had kept a round-the-clock vigil at their baby son’s bedside after he was born at the RVI on December 26.
Despite a trouble-free pregnancy, the youngster suffered three cardiac arrests within hours of his premature delivery.
When he was just a week old, he underwent an operation to drain one side of his heart and attach a pacemaker.
But sadly, the surgery wasn’t as successful as his family had hoped – and doctors said a heart transplant was his only hope.
Sarah and Chris joined the Mirror’s Change the Law for Life campaign that will make everyone a potential donor unless they ‘opt out’.
Carter’s big brother Charlie died seven years ago after being born with a condition that compromised his immune system.
It was unrelated to the younger boy’s illness.
Sarah and Chris have since set up the Charlie Cookson Foundation in a bid to support other families with seriously ill children.
The organisation has so far helped dozens of families.
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