You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J states. There she was preparing for her first album release in eight years, blissfully happy with her current love, and finally the mom to a little one after struggling to conceive for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was told she had breast cancer.
The artist, actual name Jess Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was meant as an transparent story, tackling every moment of pain she’d faced since she last made an album (endometriosis, losing a baby, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. The cancer. Later next release, her song Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and Cornish was speaking publicly about how she was thriving, while all the while dealing with the disease. Subsequently she shared the news, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” expression. “I put out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m doing every interview, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Well, not much…’” she has just had to call off performances because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.
We meet at a photo studio in London. She is sporting a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with elaborate white patches, beige footwear and oversized specs. Think motorcycle style meets vintage look. “It seems like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, thinking of the film. “They used to call me that!” She smiles. She is quick, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her standup debut in the coming year. “I love making people laugh. During performances I basically roast the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
The artist was planning an performance at the Baftas when she noticed an abnormality. “I immediately went to get it examined, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I responded, ‘Yet I sense it. I’ve got an achy arm and numbness in my fingers whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ The date was March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was serious she’d call on the start of the week. By then the singer had assured herself it was okay. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to face illness when she had a busy schedule.
“We’re two weeks away from launching this thing after years away and an extended break. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom thinking it’s all going to be positive, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have shown malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. That’s not fucking great 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 viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I fear going under. They walk you down. During crises you roll down in a bed, but then I just strolled down with a hospital gown and my rear exposed. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been lucky. Without chemo or radio, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but however Luckily it was detected early. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my affected breast now appears as a fruit under fabric.” She smiles again. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she observes, are now “uneven. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. So inconsiderate! I thought, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. Such disrespect! Ironically I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”
A History of Health Challenges
Cornish is no stranger to illness. She feels her outlook on her diagnosis has been so positive because she’s familiar with physical challenges. They have often coincided with career highs, functioning as a wake-up call, or shock, to highlight not to be complacent. “Truly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ 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 childhood, already beginning performing in the stage in a musical (she was cast at the age of 9). That’s when she was diagnosed with the medical problem WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward several years, and 17-year-old Jess has entered the female band Soul Deep while enrolled in the Brit School. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a year.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
