You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J remarks. At that moment readying for her new album launch in eight years, ecstatically in love with her current love, and at long last the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for ten years, riding high. Then in spring she was diagnosed with cancer in her breast.
The singer-songwriter, birth name Jess Cornish, is famous for speaking her mind. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an open book, addressing every moment of pain she’d endured since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, miscarriage, failed relationships, gaslighting, suicidal thoughts) with her usual frankness. The initial release, the song No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. The illness. Later second single, the upbeat Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and Cornish was speaking publicly about how she was living her best life, while still secretly dealing with her cancer. A month later she went public, and in July she had a mastectomy.
She offers me her best “Seriously?” look. “I release with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they inquire, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.
We meet at a photography studio in London. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, denim trousers with elaborate white patches, beige footwear and large glasses. Think biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, thinking of the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Cornish is sharp-witted, bold and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her initial standup show soon. “I enjoy humor. During performances I basically roast the fans.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
Cornish was getting ready for an appearance at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘But I can feel it. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was concerning she’d call on the start of the week. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to face illness when she had many commitments.
“We’re two weeks away from releasing the album after eight years without an album and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in expecting it’s all going to be good, and she says, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your reports have indicated aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. The timing is terrible.’ 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 hate being put under. They lead you. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but then I just strolled down with a medical attire and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the surgery. “Cancer is awful, but however I’m grateful it was caught soon. I underwent removal four months ago and my one side now resembles a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The subsequent surgery is both medical and cosmetic. Her chest, she observes, are now “different sizes. 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 hard period. Such disrespect! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
Past Medical Issues
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her attitude toward illness has been so optimistic because she’s used to medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or punch in the stomach, to make her recall not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has affected my well-being.”
She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut starring in the London theater in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue WPW, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She fast-forwards several years, and teenage Jess has joined the female band the group while attending the Brit School. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I need a moment. At just 17? She nods|agrees
