You can’t imagine it, Jessie J remarks. At that moment readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her current love, and finally the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for ten years, on top of the world. Suddenly in March she was found to have a breast cancer diagnosis.
The musician, actual name Jessica Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an open book, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, pregnancy loss, broken romances, gaslighting, suicidal thoughts) with characteristic openness. The first single, No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. The cancer. Later follow-up track, Living My Best Life, debuted in May and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while still secretly living with breast cancer. Subsequently she disclosed her condition, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She shoots me her best “Seriously?” look. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every interview, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to postpone shows because she’s awaiting cosmetic procedures.
We meet at a studio in the capital. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with ornate white designs, beige footwear and oversized specs. Picture biker chic meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the 70s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She beams. She is fast-thinking, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her standup debut soon. “I like entertaining. During performances I frequently joke about the audience.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was planning an performance at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; your breasts are normal.’ And I was, like, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ It happened on March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d contact on the start of the week. By then the singer had convinced herself it was okay. The way she explains it, it was simply too inconvenient to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from debuting the project after years away and an extended break. And she contacted me and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I join the call expecting it’s all going to be fine, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have come back as aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I replied, ‘That’s unfortunate. The timing is terrible.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She viewed the procedure terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They lead you. During crises you roll down in a bed, but now I just strolled down with a hospital gown and my bum hanging out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, she notes, she’s been blessed. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the surgery. “It’s terrible, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. The surgery happened four months ago and my one side now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The subsequent surgery is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she observes, are now “different sizes. The size doesn’t match. So inconsiderate! I thought, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Amusingly I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
Past Medical Issues
She is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her attitude toward illness has been so positive because she’s familiar with health crises. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to remind her not to be complacent. “Honestly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Take a seat.’ From a young age, it has consistently accompanied high points for me; a major or strange event has affected my well-being.”
She recalls to her 11-year-old self, already starting her career starring in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the medical problem Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I rehearsed between visits on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead six years, and young Jessica has become part of the trio Soul Deep while attending the Brit School. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was about to put out music in the year 2020 I had a car crash and my throat was injured and I was unable to vocalize for a twelve months.”
Hey, I say, wait, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
