You can’t imagine it, Jessie J remarks. There she was gearing up for her first album release in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her current love, and at long last the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for ten years, feeling invincible. Suddenly in spring she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The musician, real name Jessica Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The album, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an open book, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d endured since she last made an album (endometriosis, losing a baby, failed relationships, emotional abuse, suicide) with her usual frankness. The lead track, her single No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Then second single, Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was thriving, while at the same time coping with the disease. Four weeks after she went public, and in July she had a mastectomy.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” glance. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Uh, nothing really’” the singer has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo follow-up surgery.
We’re at a photography studio in London. She is sporting a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with ornate white designs, beige footwear and big frames. Imagine motorcycle style meets vintage look. “It seems like I’m in the 70s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, recalling the picture. “They used to call me that!” She beams. She is fast-thinking, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is planning to attempt her standup debut soon. “I enjoy humor. During performances I frequently joke about the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
The artist was preparing for an performance at the Baftas when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it checked, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was serious she’d reach out on the Monday. By then Cornish had convinced herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had so much on.
“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after years away and four years without a single. And she contacted me and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I log in thinking it’s all going to be good, and she informs me, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. You’re escorted. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but now I just walked with a gown on and my bum hanging out. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the procedure. “Cancer is awful, but however Thank fuck I found it early. The surgery happened recently and my affected breast now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “At least the nipple remains.”
The follow-up procedure is both medical and cosmetic. Her boobs, she notes, are now “uneven. The implant is larger than before. That’s impolite! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. So rude! Ironically I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She thinks her attitude toward illness has been so positive because she’s familiar with physical challenges. They have often coincided with peak moments, acting as a reminder, or shock, to highlight not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘You having a good time? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied high points for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”
She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already beginning performing in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was cast at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue a syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I rehearsed between visits on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She skips forward six years, and young Jessica has become part of the trio Soul Deep while attending the performing arts school. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a collision and my voice box shifted 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
