You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J says. At that moment readying for her new album launch in eight years, ecstatically in love with her newish partner, and at long last the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for ten years, feeling invincible. Then in March she was diagnosed with a breast cancer diagnosis.
The singer-songwriter, real name J. Cornish, is renowned for speaking her mind. The LP, her latest release, was meant as an open book, addressing every moment of pain she’d endured since she last worked on songs (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, broken romances, gaslighting, suicide) with her usual frankness. The lead track, No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. Her diagnosis. Later follow-up track, her song Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and the artist was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly living with her cancer. Subsequently she went public, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “What the fuck?” look. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they inquire, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” Cornish has just had to postpone shows because she’s awaiting cosmetic procedures.
We meet at a photography studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, denim trousers with ornate white designs, off-white boots and oversized specs. Imagine biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, recalling the picture. “They used to call me that!” She beams. Cornish is quick, irreverent and direct. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her initial standup show in the coming year. “I like entertaining. When performing I often tease the audience.”
Personal Battles and News
She was planning an appearance at the awards show when she found a lump. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. I’ve got an achy arm and tingling in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they said, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was concerning she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then Cornish had convinced herself it was fine. The way she explains it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had many commitments.
“Just two weeks before from releasing the album after years away and no new music. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I jump on the Zoom believing it’s all going to be positive, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your biopsy results have indicated malignant cells.’” What did you say? “I replied, ‘That’s unfortunate. The timing is terrible.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She considered the operation frightening and surreal. “I hate being put under. You’re escorted. During crises you roll down in a bed, but now I just walked with a hospital gown and my rear exposed. It felt surreal.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the procedure. “Cancer is awful, but yet I’m grateful it was caught soon. The surgery happened a few months back and my right breast now appears as a odd shape.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I reflected, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. Such disrespect! It’s funny because I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. Cancer ruined that plan.”
A History of Health Challenges
The singer is familiar with health problems. She feels her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in physical challenges. Many times they occur alongside career highs, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or blow, to highlight not to take anything for granted. “Honestly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ From a young age, it has consistently accompanied moments of success for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already starting her career featuring in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was cast at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the medical problem a syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as lightheadedness and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and teenage Jess has entered the girl group the group while enrolled in the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was ready to debut in recently I had a automobile accident and my throat was injured and I was unable to vocalize for a year.”
Oi, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
