You can’t imagine it, Jessie J remarks. At that moment readying for her new album launch in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her newish partner, and at long last the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for a decade, feeling invincible. Then in spring she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The musician, real name J. Cornish, is known for being brutally honest. The record, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an candid account, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with typical candour. The first single, No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. Her diagnosis. Later follow-up track, Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and she was talking to press about how she was thriving, while still secretly living with her cancer. Four weeks after she went public, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” expression. “I come out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” the singer has just had to postpone shows because she’s awaiting cosmetic procedures.
We’re at a studio in London. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and big frames. Imagine motorcycle style meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” A biker reference, I say, referencing the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She beams. Cornish is fast-thinking, unfiltered and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her standup debut soon. “I enjoy humor. On stage I often tease the fans.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was planning an appearance at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I immediately went to get it looked at, had an test, and they said, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘But I can feel it. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was concerning she’d call on the start of the week. By then the singer had assured herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had many commitments.
“We’re two weeks away from launching this thing after years away and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call thinking it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your reports have come back as malignant cells.’” How did you respond? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. They lead you. You know when you have emergency surgery you go on a gurney, but then I just walked with a hospital gown and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been lucky. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “It’s terrible, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I underwent removal recently and my one side now resembles a odd shape.” Another grin. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I thought, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. Such disrespect! Amusingly I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. My plans were disrupted.”
Previous Struggles
She is familiar with health problems. She feels her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with health crises. They have often coincided with career highs, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to remind her not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Hold on.’ Ever since I was a child, it has often paired with achievements for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already starting her career performing in the West End in a musical (she was selected at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and young Jessica has entered the girl group Soul Deep while studying at the performing arts school. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a year.”
Wow, I say, slow down, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
