You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J says. At that moment preparing for her first album release in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for ten years, feeling invincible. Then in March she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The singer-songwriter, birth name Jessica Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The record, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an transparent story, tackling every bit of hardship she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometriosis, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, suicide) with typical candour. The first single, her single No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. The cancer. Later follow-up track, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly living with breast cancer. Four weeks after she went public, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She gives me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every media appearance, and they’re, like, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Uh, nothing really’” Cornish has just had to postpone shows because she’s awaiting cosmetic procedures.
Our interview takes place at a photography studio in London. She is sporting a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and big frames. Imagine biker chic meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Easy Rider, I say, thinking of the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Jessie is sharp-witted, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her initial standup show in the coming year. “I like entertaining. During performances I often tease the crowd.”
Personal Battles and News
She was preparing for an appearance at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an ultrasound, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘But I can feel it. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I rise.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ It happened on March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was bad news she’d reach out on the Monday. By then she had persuaded herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was just bad timing to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.
“We’re two weeks away from releasing the album after years away and an extended break. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be positive, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have indicated malignant cells.’” What did you say? “I replied, ‘That’s unfortunate. That’s not fucking great timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. You know when you have emergency surgery you are wheeled, but this time I just strolled down with a gown on and my rear exposed. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been blessed. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the op. “It’s terrible, but however I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my affected breast now resembles a odd shape.” Another grin. “At least the nipple remains.”
The next operation is therapeutic and aesthetic. 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 hard period. So rude! Ironically I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”
A History of Health Challenges
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her attitude toward illness has been so optimistic because she’s used to physical challenges. They have often coincided with career highs, functioning as a wake-up call, or shock, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Take a seat.’ From a young age, it has often paired with high points for me; something severe or obscure has happened to my health.”
She recalls to her childhood, already starting her career starring in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine). That’s when she was told about the medical problem Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I rehearsed between visits on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She skips forward six years, and 17-year-old Jess has entered the girl group the group while enrolled in the Brit School. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in recently I had a collision and my throat was injured and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”
Hey, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
