You wouldn’t believe it, Jessie J says. At that moment readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her current love, and at long last the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, on top of the world. Suddenly in March she was told she had a breast cancer diagnosis.
The singer-songwriter, real name Jess Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The record, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an open book, tackling every moment of pain she’d endured since she last made an album (endometrial issues, pregnancy loss, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, suicidal thoughts) with her usual frankness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Later second single, the upbeat Living My Best Life, debuted in May and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while all the while coping with the disease. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in the start of summer she had a mastectomy.
She gives me her best “What the fuck?” expression. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every interview, and they inquire, ‘Any updates?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting reconstructive surgery.
We meet at a studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with elaborate white patches, cream boots and large glasses. Imagine biker chic meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Easy Rider, I say, referencing the movie. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She beams. She is quick, bold and blunt. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her standup debut next year. “I like entertaining. When performing I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
Cornish was planning an appearance at the Baftas when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an scan, and they were, like, ‘It seems benign; 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 get up.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ It happened on March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was concerning she’d call on the start of the week. By then she had convinced herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was inopportune to face illness when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after a long hiatus and no new music. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I join the call thinking it’s all going to be positive, and she goes, ‘You might want to sit.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your test results have come back as malignant cells.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘That’s unfortunate. That’s not fucking great timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She found the surgery scary and bizarre. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but this time I just walked with a hospital gown and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “Cancer is awful, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my one side now resembles a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “uneven. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I felt, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. My plans were disrupted.”
Previous Struggles
Cornish is familiar with health problems. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with physical challenges. Many times they occur alongside peak moments, acting as a reminder, or blow, to highlight not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ Ever since I was a child, it has often paired with high points for me; a serious or unusual issue has happened to my health.”
She recalls to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut performing in the London theater in the production (she was cast at the age of nine). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as dizziness and irregular beats. “I rehearsed between visits on an IV drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She fast-forwards six years, and teenage Jess has joined the trio Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”
Wow, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees