You can’t imagine it, Jessie J states. At that moment preparing for her first album release in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her current love, and finally the parent to a young child after dealing with conception issues for a decade, riding high. Suddenly in March she was diagnosed with a breast cancer diagnosis.
The singer-songwriter, birth name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an transparent story, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last made an album (a gynecological condition, losing a baby, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, mental health struggles) with typical candour. The first single, No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The cancer. Later next release, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in May and she was speaking publicly about how she was living her best life, while still secretly living with the disease. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘What’s happening?’ and I’m, like, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” the singer has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
We’re at a studio in London. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and large glasses. Imagine motorcycle style meets 70s singer aesthetic. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, recalling the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She grins. She is sharp-witted, unfiltered and filter-free. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is planning to attempt her initial standup show soon. “I love making people laugh. When performing I often tease the crowd.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was planning an appearance at the Baftas when she found a lump. “I immediately went to get it checked, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘How about a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was serious she’d call on the start of the week. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was just bad timing to receive a diagnosis when she had many commitments.
“We’re two weeks away from debuting the project after years away and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I thought, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be positive, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she reveals, ‘Unfortunately but your test results have indicated high-grade cancer cells.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They lead you. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but now I just walked with a hospital gown and my rear exposed. It felt surreal.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “Cancer is awful, but however Luckily it was detected early. The surgery happened a few months back and my affected breast now resembles a odd shape.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she remarks, are now “uneven. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I felt, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. So rude! It’s funny because I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be ideal. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Previous Struggles
She is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her attitude toward illness has been so optimistic because she’s used to health crises. They have often coincided with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or blow, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied moments of success 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 featuring in the London theater in a musical (she was cast at the age of 9). That’s when she was found to have the medical problem WPW, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as dizziness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has entered the trio Soul Deep while attending the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was ready to debut in 2020 I had a car crash and my larynx moved up and I was unable to vocalize for a year.”
Oi, I say, wait, I can’t keep up. At just 17? She nods|agrees
