You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J says. There she was preparing for her first album release in eight years, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for ten years, riding high. Suddenly in spring she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The artist, birth name Jess Cornish, is famous for speaking her mind. The album, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an transparent story, dealing with every moment of pain she’d faced since she last made an album (endometrial issues, pregnancy loss, broken romances, emotional abuse, suicidal thoughts) with characteristic openness. The first single, the song No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. The cancer. Later second single, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in May and Cornish was talking to press about how she was thriving, while still secretly dealing with the disease. Four weeks after she went public, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She shoots me her best “Seriously?” glance. “I release with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every interview, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” Cornish has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s still waiting for follow-up surgery.
Our interview takes place at a photography studio in the capital. She is sporting a beige fake-leather jacket, denim trousers with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and large glasses. Think rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the 70s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, referencing the film. “They used to call me that!” She beams. Jessie is fast-thinking, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is aiming for her initial standup show next year. “I enjoy humor. During performances I often tease the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was planning an slot at the awards show when she found a lump. “I immediately went to get it checked, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘But I can feel it. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I wake up.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was bad news she’d call on the start of the week. By then she had assured herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to receive a diagnosis when she had a busy schedule.
“Just two weeks before from debuting the project after a long hiatus and no new music. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I jump on the Zoom thinking it’s all going to be positive, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she continues, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have come back as aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I answered, ‘That’s unfortunate. What awful timing.’ 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 viewed the procedure terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. They lead you. You know when you have emergency surgery you go on a gurney, but this time I just walked with a medical attire and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the procedure. “Cancer is awful, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. The surgery happened a few months back and my affected breast now looks like a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The subsequent surgery is both medical and cosmetic. Her boobs, she observes, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. So inconsiderate! I felt, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be perfect. My plans were disrupted.”
Previous Struggles
The singer is familiar with health problems. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in medical emergencies. They have often coincided with professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Truly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Take a seat.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside high points for me; something severe or obscure has affected my well-being.”
She takes me back to her youth, already making her debut performing in the stage in the production (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the medical problem Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as lightheadedness and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an IV drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and 17-year-old Jess has become part of the female band Soul Deep while studying at the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I couldn’t sing for a year.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
