You can’t imagine it, Jessie J remarks. There she was readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her current love, and finally the parent to a young child after dealing with conception issues for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in spring she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The singer-songwriter, real name Jess Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The album, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was meant as an candid account, addressing every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, losing a baby, unsuccessful partnerships, gaslighting, suicide) with characteristic openness. The initial release, her single No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. Her diagnosis. Later second single, the upbeat Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while all the while dealing with her cancer. Subsequently she shared the news, and in early July she had a mastectomy.
She shoots me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I come out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to postpone shows because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.
Our interview takes place at a photography studio in London. She is sporting a tan faux-leather coat, jeans with elaborate white patches, beige footwear and large glasses. Picture motorcycle style meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Easy Rider, I say, thinking of the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She smiles. Cornish is sharp-witted, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her first comedy performance in the coming year. “I love making people laugh. During performances I often tease the crowd.”
Personal Battles and News
Cornish was preparing for an slot at the Baftas when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an scan, and they were, like, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they said, ‘How about a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d call on the Monday. By then Cornish had persuaded herself it was fine. The way she explains it, it was inopportune to receive a diagnosis when she had many commitments.
“Just two weeks before from releasing the album after a long hiatus and four years without a single. And she contacted me and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I thought, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your test results have shown high-grade cancer cells.’” What did you say? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She found the surgery frightening and surreal. “I hate being put under. You’re escorted. You know when you have emergency surgery you are wheeled, but then I just strolled down with a gown on and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Luckily it was detected early. I underwent removal recently and my affected breast now looks like a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The next operation is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she observes, are now “asymmetrical. The size doesn’t match. So inconsiderate! I thought, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a difficult experience. So rude! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”
A History of Health Challenges
She is no stranger to illness. She thinks her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s used to health crises. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or punch in the stomach, to make her recall not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside high points for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She reminisces to her youth, already beginning starring in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was found to have the medical problem a syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as lightheadedness and palpitations. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and young Jessica has become part of the girl group Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was ready to debut in 2020 I had a car crash and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a year.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I need a moment. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
