You can’t imagine it, Jessie J states. There she was preparing for her comeback record in eight years, deeply enamored with her newish partner, and at long last the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for a decade, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was diagnosed with cancer in her breast.
The musician, birth name Jess Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an candid account, tackling every bit of hardship she’d endured since she last worked on songs (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, suicidal thoughts) with her usual frankness. The first single, No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Later second single, Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while still secretly living with her cancer. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” glance. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I’m, like, ‘Well, not much…’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting reconstructive surgery.
We meet at a photo studio in London. She is sporting a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with elaborate white patches, beige footwear and big frames. Think rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, recalling the film. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. Jessie is quick, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her standup debut next year. “I like entertaining. On stage I basically roast the fans.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
The artist was preparing for an slot at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an scan, and they said, ‘It seems benign; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘However, it’s there. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was bad news she’d call on the Monday. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was okay. The way she tells it, it was simply too inconvenient to get cancer when she had many commitments.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after eight years without an album and no new music. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom believing it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have shown aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I replied, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. During crises you go on a gurney, but then I just marched with a medical attire and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the procedure. “It’s terrible, but you know what? Luckily it was detected early. I had the mastectomy recently and my one side now resembles a odd shape.” A further beam. “At least the nipple remains.”
The subsequent surgery is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her chest, she observes, are now “uneven. The implant is larger than before. That’s impolite! I thought, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be ideal. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Previous Struggles
She is no stranger to illness. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside career highs, functioning as a wake-up call, or punch in the stomach, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside high points for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”
She takes me back to her childhood, already beginning performing in the stage in a musical (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was found to have the cardiac issue WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and irregular beats. “I rehearsed between visits on an IV drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She fast-forwards six years, and teenage Jess has entered the girl group Soul Deep while studying at the performing arts school. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I am overwhelmed. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
