You wouldn’t believe it, Jessie J states. There she was readying for her comeback record in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her newish partner, and finally the parent to a young child after dealing with conception issues for ten years, riding high. Then in spring she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The artist, actual name Jessica Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The record, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an transparent story, tackling every bit of hardship she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometriosis, losing a baby, failed relationships, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Then follow-up track, the upbeat Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and she was talking to press about how she was thriving, while still secretly dealing with breast cancer. Subsequently she shared the news, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” look. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Well, not much…’” she has just had to postpone shows because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
We meet at a photo studio in London. She is wearing a beige fake-leather jacket, blue jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and large glasses. Imagine motorcycle style meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, thinking of the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She beams. She is sharp-witted, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is planning to attempt her first comedy performance in the coming year. “I like entertaining. On stage I often tease the audience.”
Personal Battles and News
She was preparing for an performance at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I immediately went to get it looked at, had an test, 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 rise.’ And they said, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d call on the start of the week. By then she had convinced herself it was nothing. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I jump on the Zoom believing it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘You might want to sit.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she reveals, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have come back as aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘That’s unfortunate. That’s not fucking great timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but this time I just walked with a medical attire and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, she adds, she’s been fortunate. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the surgery. “It’s terrible, but however I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy recently and my right breast now resembles a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “At least the nipple remains.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she notes, are now “uneven. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I reflected, no need to bully me, I’m already having a hard period. So rude! It’s funny because I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
The singer is familiar with health problems. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s used to medical emergencies. Frequently they align with peak moments, acting as a reminder, or shock, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘You having a good time? Take a seat.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied moments of success for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut performing in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of 9). That’s when she was told about the heart condition WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as vertigo and irregular beats. “I rehearsed between visits on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has joined the trio the group while studying at 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 recently I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Hey, I say, wait, I need a moment. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
