You can’t imagine it, Jessie J remarks. At that moment gearing up for her new album launch in eight years, deeply enamored with her current love, and at long last the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for ten years, riding high. Suddenly in March she was told she had a breast cancer diagnosis.
The artist, birth name J. Cornish, is famous for being brutally honest. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an open book, tackling every moment of pain she’d endured since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, losing a baby, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, suicide) with her usual frankness. The first single, the song 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 May and she was giving interviews about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while all the while dealing with breast cancer. A month later she shared the news, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every media appearance, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Uh, nothing really’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting reconstructive surgery.
We’re at a photography studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, jeans with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and oversized specs. Picture rocker vibe meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the film. “They used to call me that!” She beams. Cornish is quick, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is planning to attempt her standup debut soon. “I like entertaining. During performances I often tease the crowd.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was preparing for an appearance at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I immediately went to get it looked at, had an test, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; your tissue is healthy.’ And I responded, ‘Yet I sense it. I’ve got an achy arm and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they suggested, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was concerning she’d contact on the start of the week. By then Cornish had persuaded herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to get cancer when she had so much on.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after eight years without an album and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I thought, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I jump on the Zoom believing it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have indicated malignant cells.’” What did you say? “I replied, ‘That’s unfortunate. The timing is terrible.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. You’re escorted. During crises you roll down in a bed, but this time I just marched with a gown on and my rear exposed. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she notes, she’s been blessed. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “It’s terrible, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy recently and my affected breast now appears as a odd shape.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The next operation is both medical and cosmetic. Her chest, she observes, are now “uneven. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a hard period. Such disrespect! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be flawless. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
She is familiar with health problems. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s used to physical challenges. They have often coincided with peak moments, acting as a reminder, or blow, to make her recall not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has often paired with achievements for me; a major or strange event has affected my well-being.”
She reminisces to her childhood, already beginning starring in the London theater in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was diagnosed with the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as dizziness and palpitations. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an intravenous line, and being readmitted at night.” She skips forward six years, and 17-year-old Jess has become part of the female band Soul Deep while studying at the academy. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a car crash and my larynx moved up and I lost my voice for a year.”
Wow, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
