Athletic dad, 36, who felt numbness in fingers diagnosed with incurable brain cancer

Personal trainer Jack Carpenter was so shocked by the news he passed out

An athletic dad who felt numbness in his fingers has been diagnosed with incurable brain cancer. Personal trainer Jack Carpenter started noticing strange sensations in his fingertips in June.

The 36-year-old also realised he could not carry out simple tasks like switching off the car and picking up a pen. He had a CT scan two months later before medics gave him the devastating diagnosis.

Doctors said they had found three tumours in his brain, with the news so shocking that Jack passed out in a chair. The dad - who is married to 36-year-old wife Emily - has now been given a prognosis of between three and five years.

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He was diagnosed with a grade three astrocytoma, an aggressive, incurable form of brain cancer, in September. Jack - Felixstowe, East Suffolk- will under go a course of radiotherapy and chemotherapy treatment from October 21.

The family hopes the treatment will improve his prognosis and reduce the size of the tumours. Doctors told Jack he has the body of a 21-year-old athlete thanks to his previous fitness regime.

He owns an obstacle course racing training facility called Field Fit. Jack, who had two daughters, Margot, three, and Elodie, said: "I have come to the realisation that this will eventually get me but I'm not letting anyone tell me I have two years, five years, one year.

"It's sad and obviously you do cry, you think about your children, but I'm not feeling sad anymore as my immediate attention has turned to proving people wrong. They don't know me, they don't know my level of fitness, they don't know the strength I'm taking to do everything I can to crush those five years.''

Jack's family has since launched a GoFundMe page to help cover his everyday costs. Wife Emily - a professional fundraiser working for the mental health charity Mind - said the 'emotional toll is huge'' after previously losing her mother to cancer a week before her 21st birthday.

She said: "This obviously just flashes me back to that time and there's lots of emotion with that. For me, it's a different hard to how Jack is finding it because I'm having to deal with the emotions of my children and my own emotions.''

Recalling his symptoms, Jack said: "I'd go to turn the engine off in my car and my brain would freeze, so I know what I wanted to do but my left finger wouldn't push the button.

"Even simple things like picking up a pen, I would miss the pen to pick it up." Jack's GP ran a number of tests, such as testing his eyesight and balance, but could not find any major issues.

His doctors initially thought it could be a trapped nerve but Jack was soon told by his local hospital in Ipswich that he needed a routine CT scan. He was later told he had three tumours.

Emily said: "Jack went into complete shock, he passed out in the chair." He was referred to the neurology department of Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge where one of his tumours was tested during a biopsy on September 4.

On September 10, Jack received his diagnosis - a grade three astrocytoma. Since then, he has been taking steroids to reduce the swelling in his brain.

Emily said: "A lot of my sadness is sadness for Margot and Elodie - they're desperate for normality and it's hard for us to give them that right now. I'm a mum and I'm trying to protect my two girls from this."

Jack said he has since thought "why me?", adding: "My doctor told me that from the neck down, I'm a 21-year-old fully-fledged athlete.

"Sometimes I lay in bed and think "why me? What have I done to deserve this?" but it's nothing I've done that has caused this. I'm just that 1 per cent, a very unlucky person that whatever's caused this is possibly a DNA snip gone wrong somewhere."

Jack has also been struggling with tiredness, adding: "There's lots of cancer factors right now and it's learning everyday what's the best thing to do.

"But how do I explain to my daughter that I don't want to do jigsaws with her because I'm so tired?" Emily added that their eldest daughter is aware of how her dad is feeling, adding: "She's so in tune with us and any little waver of negativity in the house, she latches onto it straight away.

"She knows daddy's head is poorly but it's really hard." Jack has since started a ketogenic diet, which involves cutting out sugars and hormones and eating organic fruits, vegetables and grass-fed meats.

He has also placed cheese plants around their home to help boost the oxygen levels in their surroundings. He said: "If you can feed your body with really good, healthy fats, you're getting all that goodness up to the brain, which hopefully should help."

More than £6,000 has been raised on the GoFundMe page. Those who cannot donate can help the family in other ways, such as keeping Jack company at his hospital appointments or taking their dog out for long walks.

Jack said: "It makes you realise how amazing people are, it makes me well up to see people donating." Emily added: "I'm constantly blown away by people's generosity but when it's happening to you, it's so humbling."

See the fundraiser here.