You can’t imagine it, Jessie J says. At that moment gearing up for her comeback record in eight years, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was told she had breast cancer.
The musician, actual name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for being brutally honest. The album, her latest release, was supposed to be an open book, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, pregnancy loss, broken romances, psychological manipulation, suicidal thoughts) with her usual frankness. The lead track, No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Later follow-up track, her song Living My Best Life, came out in May and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while all the while living with the disease. Subsequently she shared the news, and in the start of summer she had a mastectomy.
She offers me her best “What the fuck?” look. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every media appearance, and they inquire, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s yet to undergo cosmetic procedures.
Our interview takes place at a photo studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and large glasses. Picture biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, thinking of the film. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. She is fast-thinking, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her standup debut next year. “I like entertaining. During performances I often tease the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
The artist was getting ready for an appearance at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I immediately went to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they were, like, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ It happened on March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was bad news she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then Cornish had assured herself it was okay. The way she explains it, it was simply too inconvenient to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.
“We’re two weeks away from launching this thing after eight years without an album and an extended break. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom expecting it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘You might want to sit.’ The solemn tone? And she says, ‘Unfortunately but your test results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I answered, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. They lead you. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but now I just strolled down with a gown on and my bum hanging out. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been blessed. Without chemo or radio, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but however Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my one side now looks like a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The subsequent surgery is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she notes, are now “different sizes. The size doesn’t match. So inconsiderate! I felt, no need to bully me, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! It’s funny because I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be flawless. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
She is no stranger to illness. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. They have often coincided with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or shock, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Honestly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Take a seat.’ Ever since I was a child, it has often paired with achievements for me; a major or strange event has affected my well-being.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut starring in the London theater in a musical (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue a syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has entered the trio Soul Deep while studying at the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a car crash and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I am overwhelmed. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
