You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J says. There she was readying for her first album release in eight years, deeply enamored with her newish partner, and at long last the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for ten years, riding high. Then in March she was told she had a breast cancer diagnosis.
The singer-songwriter, birth name Jessica Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The LP, her latest release, was meant as an transparent story, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d endured since she last made an album (endometriosis, miscarriage, broken romances, emotional abuse, suicide) with characteristic openness. The initial release, No Secrets, was released in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. Her diagnosis. Later next release, Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and she was giving interviews about how she was thriving, while still secretly coping with the disease. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “Are you kidding?” expression. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I’m, like, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo cosmetic procedures.
We meet at a photography studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and large glasses. Think motorcycle style meets 70s singer aesthetic. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the movie. “They used to call me that!” She beams. She is quick, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her standup debut in the coming year. “I love making people laugh. During performances I basically roast the audience.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
Cornish was planning an slot at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it examined, had an scan, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘However, it’s there. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was serious she’d contact on the Monday. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was fine. The way she explains it, it was inopportune to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from debuting the project after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ 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, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have indicated malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I replied, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They lead you. During crises you roll down in a bed, but now I just strolled down with a medical attire and my rear exposed. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been blessed. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the procedure. “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. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The follow-up procedure is both medical and cosmetic. Her chest, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I thought, no need to bully me, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! Amusingly I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
Past Medical Issues
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She thinks her attitude toward illness has been so positive because she’s experienced in health crises. Frequently they align with peak moments, acting as a reminder, or blow, to highlight not to be complacent. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ Ever since I was a child, it has consistently accompanied high points for me; something severe or obscure has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her childhood, already making her debut starring in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of 9). That’s when she was diagnosed with the medical problem Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She skips forward several years, and teenage Jess has entered the trio Soul Deep while studying at the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was planning to release songs in the year 2020 I had a automobile accident and my voice box shifted and I was unable to vocalize for a twelve months.”
Hey, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
