You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J says. At that moment gearing up for her first album release in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her current love, and finally the mom to a little one after struggling to conceive for a decade, on top of the world. Then in spring she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The musician, actual name Jessica Cornish, is famous for speaking her mind. The album, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was meant as an candid account, dealing with every moment of pain she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometrial issues, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with characteristic openness. The first single, the song No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. The cancer. Then next release, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in May and Cornish was speaking publicly about how she was thriving, while at the same time dealing with her cancer. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Well, not much…’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s awaiting reconstructive surgery.
We meet at a studio in London. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and oversized specs. Imagine biker chic meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, referencing the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She grins. She is quick, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her initial standup show next year. “I enjoy humor. When performing I basically roast the audience.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was planning an appearance at the Baftas when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it checked, had an test, and they said, ‘It appears fine; your breasts are normal.’ And I was, like, ‘But I can feel it. I’ve got an achy arm and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then the singer had assured herself it was fine. The way she explains it, it was just bad timing to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after a long hiatus and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I thought, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I jump on the Zoom expecting it’s all going to be good, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have come back as malignant cells.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. That’s not fucking great timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She considered the operation scary and bizarre. “I fear going under. You’re escorted. During crises you roll down in a bed, but this time I just marched with a hospital gown and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the procedure. “It’s terrible, but you know what? Luckily it was detected early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my affected breast now looks like a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “The nipple was preserved.”
The next operation is both medical and cosmetic. Her chest, she observes, are now “asymmetrical. The size doesn’t match. That’s impolite! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! It’s funny because I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be flawless. My plans were disrupted.”
Previous Struggles
Cornish is familiar with health problems. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in physical challenges. They have often coincided with career highs, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or blow, to remind her not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Hold on.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”
She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut starring in the West End in a musical (she was selected at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She fast-forwards several years, and young Jessica has joined the female band Soul Deep while enrolled in the Brit School. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a year.”
Hey, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
