You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J remarks. At that moment readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her newish partner, and finally the mom to a little one after dealing with conception issues for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was found to have a breast cancer diagnosis.
The artist, birth name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for being brutally honest. The record, the provocatively titled album, was supposed to be an open book, dealing with every moment of pain she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometrial issues, miscarriage, broken romances, emotional abuse, suicide) with her usual frankness. The first single, No Secrets, was released in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. Her diagnosis. Later second single, Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while at the same time living with breast cancer. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in the start of summer she underwent breast removal surgery.
She offers me her best “What the fuck?” expression. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every interview, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to call off performances because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.
We’re at a photography studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with ornate white designs, beige footwear and large glasses. Picture rocker vibe meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Like the film, I say, referencing the film. “That’s what people called me at school!” She beams. Jessie is quick, bold and blunt. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is hoping to make her first comedy performance next year. “I love making people laugh. During performances I frequently joke about the fans.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
Cornish was preparing for an performance at the Baftas when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it checked, had an ultrasound, and they said, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they said, ‘We should biopsy it?’ It happened on March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d contact on the Monday. By then the singer had assured 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 launching this thing after eight years without an album and an extended break. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be fine, and she goes, ‘You might want to sit.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have come back as aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I answered, ‘That’s unfortunate. That’s not fucking great timing.’ My initial thought 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 hate being put under. You’re escorted. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but now I just strolled down with a gown on and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, Cornish says, she’s been blessed. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “It’s terrible, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. The surgery happened a few months back and my affected breast now appears as a odd shape.” Another grin. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The subsequent surgery is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she remarks, 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. Such disrespect! It’s funny because I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
The singer is familiar with health problems. She believes her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s used to health crises. They have often coincided with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or blow, to make her recall not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Enjoying yourself? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has often paired with achievements for me; something severe or obscure has affected my well-being.”
She reminisces to her youth, already starting her career featuring in the London theater in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the heart condition WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I rehearsed between visits on an IV drip, and being readmitted at night.” She skips forward several years, and 17-year-old Jess has entered the girl group Soul Deep while attending the Brit School. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was about to put out music in the year 2020 I had a automobile accident and my throat was injured and I couldn’t sing for a year.”
Hey, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
