You wouldn’t believe it, Jessie J says. There she was readying for her comeback record in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for ten years, riding high. Suddenly in spring she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The musician, birth name Jessica Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The record, her latest release, was intended as an candid account, addressing every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, miscarriage, broken romances, psychological manipulation, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The lead track, the song No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Later follow-up track, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and the artist was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while at the same time coping with the disease. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in the start of summer she had a mastectomy.
She offers me her best “Seriously?” glance. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every media appearance, and they inquire, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I’m, like, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting cosmetic procedures.
Our interview takes place at a studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with ornate white designs, off-white boots and oversized specs. Think rocker vibe meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the 1970s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She beams. She is quick, bold and blunt. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her initial standup show soon. “I like entertaining. On stage I basically roast the fans.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was preparing for an performance at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an test, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I responded, ‘But I can feel it. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d call on the Monday. By then Cornish 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 debuting the project after years away and an extended break. And she contacted me and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be fine, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have shown aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘Well, that’s not great. The timing is terrible.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She found the surgery frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. During crises you go on a gurney, but then I just walked with a hospital gown and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “Cancer is awful, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. I underwent removal a few months back and my affected breast now looks like a odd shape.” A further beam. “At least the nipple remains.”
The subsequent surgery 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! 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 ideal. Cancer ruined that plan.”
A History of Health Challenges
The singer is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in physical challenges. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, acting as a reminder, or blow, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘You having a good time? Hold on.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already starting her career starring in the London theater in a musical (she was chosen 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 rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and teenage Jess has entered the trio the group while attending the academy. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a long period.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
