You can’t imagine it, Jessie J says. There she was preparing for her new album launch in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the parent to a young child after struggling to conceive for ten years, feeling invincible. Then in March she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The musician, real name Jessica Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an transparent story, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometrial issues, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with typical candour. The lead track, the song No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Then next release, the upbeat Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was thriving, while at the same time dealing with breast cancer. Four weeks after she went public, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.
She offers me her best “What the fuck?” look. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every media appearance, and they’re, like, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.
We’re at a photography studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, jeans with ornate white designs, beige footwear and big frames. Imagine motorcycle style meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the seventies and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” A biker reference, I say, recalling the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. She is sharp-witted, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is planning to attempt her standup debut next year. “I like entertaining. On stage I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Personal Battles and News
She was planning an performance at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I immediately went to get it checked, had an test, and they said, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. I’ve got an achy arm and numbness in my fingers whenever I wake up.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was bad news she’d contact on the Monday. By then Cornish had convinced herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after a long hiatus and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I assumed, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be good, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have shown aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. That’s not fucking great timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She considered the operation scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. They lead you. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but now I just marched with a gown on and my bum hanging out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, she adds, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but however I’m grateful it was caught soon. I underwent removal four months ago and my one side now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she notes, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. How rude! I felt, no need to bully me, I’m already having a difficult experience. Such disrespect! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
A History of Health Challenges
Cornish is no stranger to illness. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so optimistic because she’s experienced in medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or punch in the stomach, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Honestly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘You having a good time? Take a seat.’ Since childhood, 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 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 rapid pulse as well as dizziness and palpitations. “I rehearsed between visits on an IV drip, and being readmitted at night.” She fast-forwards six years, and 17-year-old Jess has become part of the female band the group while studying at the performing arts school. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a collision and my larynx moved up and I was unable to vocalize for a twelve months.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
