You can’t imagine it, Jessie J says. There she was preparing for her first album release in eight years, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, riding high. Then in March she was found to have a breast cancer diagnosis.
The singer-songwriter, real name Jessica Cornish, is known for being brutally honest. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was supposed to be an open book, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d endured since she last made an album (endometrial issues, miscarriage, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Then second single, Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while at the same time dealing with breast cancer. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in July she had a mastectomy.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” look. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every media appearance, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s still waiting for cosmetic procedures.
We meet at a photo studio in the capital. She is wearing a light brown synthetic jacket, blue jeans with detailed white appliqués, off-white boots and oversized specs. Think rocker vibe meets 70s singer aesthetic. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” A biker reference, I say, referencing the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She smiles. She is fast-thinking, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is planning to attempt her standup debut soon. “I like entertaining. During performances I frequently joke about the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
The artist was getting ready for an performance at the Baftas when she noticed an abnormality. “I immediately went to get it examined, had an test, and they said, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was concerning she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then Cornish had persuaded herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was inopportune to receive a diagnosis when she had a busy schedule.
“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after years away and an extended break. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom thinking it’s all going to be good, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she says, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” What did you say? “I said, ‘That’s unfortunate. That’s not fucking great timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She considered the operation frightening and surreal. “I fear going under. You’re escorted. During crises you roll down in a bed, but now I just walked with a gown on and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been blessed. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the op. “Cancer is awful, but you know what? Luckily it was detected early. I underwent removal recently and my right breast now resembles a odd shape.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she observes, are now “uneven. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I felt, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
She is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so optimistic because she’s used to physical challenges. Many times they occur alongside peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or punch in the stomach, to highlight not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Enjoying yourself? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has often paired with moments of success for me; something severe or obscure has happened to my health.”
She recalls to her childhood, already making her debut performing in the West End in Whistle Down the Wind (she was selected at the age of 9). That’s when she was diagnosed with the medical problem a syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and palpitations. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an IV drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and teenage Jess has entered the female band Soul Deep while studying at the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I couldn’t sing for a year.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
