You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J remarks. At that moment preparing for her comeback record in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her newish partner, and finally the mom to a little one after dealing with conception issues for a decade, feeling invincible. Then in spring she was diagnosed with cancer in her breast.
The musician, birth name Jessica Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The record, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was meant as an transparent story, addressing every bit of hardship she’d experienced since she last made an album (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, broken romances, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Later second single, her song Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and the artist was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while at the same time coping with the disease. A month later she went public, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” expression. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I answer, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” Cornish has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s still waiting for cosmetic procedures.
We meet at a photography studio in London. She is sporting a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and oversized specs. Picture motorcycle style meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, referencing the film. “They used to call me that!” She grins. Cornish is sharp-witted, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is planning to attempt her first comedy performance next year. “I enjoy humor. When performing I frequently joke about the audience.”
Personal Battles and News
Cornish was planning an slot at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an ultrasound, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; your breasts are normal.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and numbness in my fingers whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d call on the Monday. By then Cornish had convinced herself it was fine. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to face illness when she had so much on.
“We’re two weeks away from releasing the album after a long hiatus and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be good, and she says, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she says, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She viewed the procedure terrifying and absurd. “I fear going under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but this time I just walked with a gown on and my bum hanging out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she notes, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “It’s terrible, but yet I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my right breast now resembles a odd shape.” Another grin. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she observes, are now “uneven. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I felt, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. How offensive! It’s funny because I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be flawless. My plans were disrupted.”
Past Medical Issues
The singer is accustomed to medical issues. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s used to health crises. They have often coincided with professional successes, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or punch in the stomach, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Honestly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Take a seat.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside high points for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already beginning featuring in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was selected at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the medical problem a syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an IV drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She fast-forwards six years, and teenage Jess has entered the girl group Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I signed my initial contract, 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 long period.”
Hey, I say, hold on, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
