A young father who has been diagnosed with incurable brain cancer after experiencing numbness in his fingers has boldly declared he will “crush” his five-year prognosis. Jack Carpenter, a 36-year-old personal trainer, realised something was amiss when he started feeling odd sensations in his fingertips and struggled with simple tasks such as turning off the car or grasping a pen.
After undergoing a CT scan two months later, Jack and his wife Emily, also aged 36, were devastated to learn that doctors had discovered three tumours in his brain—an incident so shocking that Jack fainted upon receiving the news. In September, he was officially diagnosed with grade three astrocytoma, a formidable and untreatable form of brain cancer, and given three to five years to live.
Nonetheless, from October 21, Jack will commence a regimen of radiotherapy and chemotherapy to try and shrink the tumours. He’s also launched into various health kicks with the goal of prolonging his life for his young daughters, Margot, three, and Elodie, one.
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“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,” Jack, whose family have launched a GoFundMe page to support him, told PA Real Life. “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.”
Emily, who works as a professional fundraiser for Mind, the mental health charity, shared the emotional impact of her partner’s illness, especially after losing her mother to cancer just before her 21st birthday.
“This obviously just flashes me back to that time and there’s lots of emotion with that,” she said. “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.”
Started feeling unusual symptoms in June
In June, Jack, from Felixstowe, East Suffolk, began experiencing unusual numbness in his fingers and a disconnect between his brain’s commands and his body’s responses.
“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,” he explained. “Even simple things like picking up a pen, I would miss the pen to pick it up.”
Jack visited his GP where a number of tests were conducted, including checks on his eyesight and balance, but no significant issues were identified. Initially suspected to be a trapped nerve, Jack was advised by his local hospital in Ipswich to have a routine CT scan to rule out other concerns, which took place on August 27.
Devastated by the results, Jack’s partner Emily recounted the harrowing moment: “Jack went into complete shock, he passed out in the chair,” after they learned the scan had revealed three brain tumours.
He was quickly referred to Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge for further investigation, where a biopsy performed on September 4 confirmed one of the tumours. On September 10, Jack received the grim diagnosis of a grade three astrocytoma.
In an effort to combat the swelling in his brain, Jack has been on steroids since the diagnosis, with plans to commence radiotherapy and chemotherapy treatment at Ipswich Hospital starting October 21.
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,” and added, “I’m a mum and I’m trying to protect my two girls from this.”
Despite living a markedly healthy lifestyle as a personal trainer and athlete for eight years, which includes running his own obstacle course racing training facility, Jack said: “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%, a very unlucky person that whatever’s caused this is possibly a DNA snip gone wrong somewhere.”
Jack mentioned he has also been grappling with fatigue following any form of physical activity, which he said has been challenging to explain to his young daughter Margot. “There’s lots of cancer factors right now and it’s learning everyday what’s the best thing to do,” he said.
“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’s superpower is her “emotional intelligence”, stating: “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 embarked on a series of health kicks, such as implementing a ketogenic diet, which involves eliminating sugars and hormones and consuming organic fruits, vegetables and grass-fed meats, and placing cheese plants around their home to help enhance the oxygen levels in their environment. “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,” he explained.
The family have also established a GoFundMe page to assist with the everyday costs of Jack’s treatment.
So far, they’ve managed to raise over £6,000, and while financial contributions continue to flood in, offers of practical support are welcome too — such as keeping Jack company during his hospital visits or helping take the family dog for walks. “It makes you realise how amazing people are, it makes me well up to see people donating,” expressed Jack.
Sharing in her husband’s sentiment, charity worker Emily said: “I’m constantly blown away by people’s generosity but when it’s happening to you, it’s so humbling.”
For more information or to make a donation, please visit the family’s fundraising page here.
