Jonnie Irwin says he has just months to live as he fights terminal cancer

TV star Jonnie Irwin does want his children’s mental status to be affected as he has admitted to keeping his shock terminal cancer diagnosis from them in a bid to preserve their innocence.

The 48-year-old father-of-three, who presents Channel 4's A Place In The Sun and the BBC's Escape To The Country, revealed his lung cancer had tragically spread to his brain, telling this week's Hello magazine: 'I don't know how long I have left.'

Irwin revealed the first warning sign of his illness came while he was filming A Place In The Sun in August 2020 in Italy, when his vision became blurry while driving. Doctors at home discovered he was terminally ill. Cancer drugs and chemotherapy have helped prolong his life.

The TV presenter, who has son Rex, three, and two-year-old twins Rafa and Cormac with his wife Jessica, said he had chosen to keep his illness from his eldest child, in particular, saying he does not want to 'shatter his innocence'.

'He doesn't need to know yet', Irwin said, adding: 'We make fun of my hair - he calls it my 'spiky head' - but as far as he's concerned, his dad is normal and why would I shatter that innocence?'

Irwin said that his cancer will 'catch up' with him at some point, but he is doing everything he can to 'hold that day off for as long as possible' - revealing that he is teaching Rex how to ride his bicycle among enjoying other activities together such as playing football and going to the beach.

The Leicestershire-born presenter is being supported by his wife Jessica, 40. He said: 'Within a week of flying back from filming, I was being given six months to live. I had to go home and tell my wife, who was looking after our babies, that she was on her own pretty much. That was devastating. All I could do was apologise to her. I felt so responsible.'

The couple live with their three children in Newcastle, having moved there from Hertfordshire in 2020. Jonnie said he had chosen to keep his illness private until now.