You wouldn’t believe it, Jessie J remarks. There she was readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and finally the parent to a young child after dealing with conception issues for ten years, riding high. Then in spring she was told she had cancer in her breast.
The singer-songwriter, birth name J. Cornish, is renowned for speaking her mind. The album, her latest release, was intended as an open book, addressing every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, miscarriage, failed relationships, gaslighting, suicidal thoughts) with typical candour. The lead track, No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. Her diagnosis. Later second single, Living My Best Life, debuted in May and she was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while still secretly living with the disease. Subsequently she shared the news, and in the start of summer she underwent breast removal surgery.
She shoots me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every media appearance, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.
We’re at a photo studio in London. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, denim trousers with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and oversized specs. Imagine rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, referencing the picture. “They used to call me that!” She grins. She is fast-thinking, unfiltered and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her initial standup show soon. “I enjoy humor. On stage I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
The artist was preparing for an slot at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it checked, had an test, and they said, ‘It appears fine; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The specialist told her if it was concerning she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was inopportune to face illness when she had a busy schedule.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after years away and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call expecting it’s all going to be positive, and she goes, ‘You might want to sit.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘I regret to inform you but your reports have indicated high-grade cancer cells.’” What did you say? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I fear going under. They lead you. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but now I just strolled down with a medical attire and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she notes, she’s been blessed. Without chemo or radio, just the op. “Cancer is awful, but however I’m grateful it was caught soon. The surgery happened four months ago and my affected breast now resembles a odd shape.” Another grin. “The nipple was preserved.”
The next operation is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her chest, she observes, are now “uneven. The size doesn’t match. So inconsiderate! I thought, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a hard period. Such disrespect! It’s funny because I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Past Medical Issues
Cornish is no stranger to illness. She feels her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in physical challenges. They have often coincided with professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Honestly, I feel fate says, ‘You having a good time? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied high points for me; a major or strange event has affected my well-being.”
She takes me back to her youth, already beginning performing in the West End in Whistle Down the Wind (she was cast at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She fast-forwards several years, and 17-year-old Jess has entered the trio Soul Deep while studying at the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”
Oi, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
