You can’t imagine it, Jessie J states. At that moment preparing for her first album release in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The artist, birth name Jessica Cornish, is famous for speaking her mind. The record, her latest release, was intended as an open book, dealing with every moment of pain she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometriosis, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, suicidal thoughts) with characteristic openness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Later next release, her song Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and the artist was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly dealing with breast cancer. A month later she shared the news, and in the start of summer she underwent breast removal surgery.
She offers me her best “What the fuck?” look. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they inquire, ‘What’s happening?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to postpone shows because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
We’re at a studio in London. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and large glasses. Picture biker chic meets vintage look. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, recalling the movie. “They used to call me that!” She beams. Jessie is sharp-witted, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is planning to attempt her standup debut next year. “I enjoy humor. During performances I often tease the fans.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
Cornish was planning an slot at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it checked, 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. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was serious she’d reach out on the Monday. By then the singer had assured herself it was fine. The way she tells it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had so much on.
“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after years away and an extended break. And she contacted me and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I thought, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be good, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have shown high-grade cancer cells.’” How did you respond? “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 considered the operation terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. During crises you go on a gurney, but now I just strolled down with a gown on and my bum hanging out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been blessed. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the surgery. “Cancer is awful, but however I’m grateful it was caught soon. I underwent removal a few months back and my affected breast now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is both medical and cosmetic. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. The size doesn’t match. So inconsiderate! I thought, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be flawless. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Previous Struggles
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with health crises. Frequently they align with professional successes, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or blow, to remind her not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied moments of success for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She recalls to her childhood, already making her debut performing in the West End in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the heart condition WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She skips forward six years, and young Jessica has become part of the girl group the group while enrolled in the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was about to put out music in the year 2020 I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I couldn’t sing for a year.”
Wow, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
