You wouldn’t believe it, Jessie J remarks. There she was gearing up for her first album release in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for a decade, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was told she had cancer in her breast.
The singer-songwriter, real name Jess Cornish, is famous for being brutally honest. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was meant as an transparent story, addressing every moment of pain she’d endured since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, gaslighting, suicide) with her usual frankness. The lead track, the song No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Later second single, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in May and she was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while at the same time coping with breast cancer. A month later she shared the news, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She shoots me her best “Seriously?” look. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they’re, like, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.
We meet at a studio in the capital. She is wearing a light brown synthetic jacket, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, off-white boots and oversized specs. Imagine motorcycle style meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, referencing the movie. “That’s what people called me at school!” She grins. Cornish is sharp-witted, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is hoping to make her initial standup show next year. “I love making people laugh. During performances I basically roast the fans.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
The artist was preparing for an slot at the awards show when she noticed an abnormality. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an test, and they said, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they said, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then she had assured herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.
“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be positive, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your reports have shown malignant cells.’” What did you say? “I said, ‘That’s unfortunate. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but now I just walked with a hospital gown and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the surgery. “Cancer is awful, but yet I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my affected breast now looks like a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” Another grin. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her chest, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I felt, why make it worse, I’m already having a rough time. Such disrespect! It’s funny because I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
A History of Health Challenges
She is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s used to medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside career highs, functioning as a wake-up call, or shock, to highlight not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has often paired with moments of success for me; a serious or unusual issue has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already beginning performing in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was selected at the age of 9). That’s when she was diagnosed with the cardiac issue WPW, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and going back into hospital at night.” She skips forward six years, and young Jessica 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 brain incident. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my throat was injured and I couldn’t sing for a year.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I need a moment. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
