You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J remarks. At that moment readying for her comeback record in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her current love, and at long last the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for a decade, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was told she had a breast cancer diagnosis.
The artist, real name Jessica Cornish, is known for speaking her mind. The album, her latest release, was intended as an open book, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d experienced since she last made an album (endometrial issues, losing a baby, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, suicide) with characteristic openness. The first single, the song No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Later second single, Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while still secretly living with the disease. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in early July she had a mastectomy.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” expression. “I put out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Well, not much…’” she has just had to call off performances because she’s still waiting for follow-up surgery.
Our interview takes place at a studio in the capital. She is sporting a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and oversized specs. Picture motorcycle style meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, referencing the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She smiles. She is quick, unfiltered and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is planning to attempt her first comedy performance soon. “I like entertaining. During performances I often tease the audience.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
The artist was planning an slot at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It appears fine; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I insisted, ‘But I can feel it. I’ve got an achy arm and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was concerning she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then Cornish had convinced herself it was okay. The way she tells it, it was simply too inconvenient to face illness when she had many commitments.
“Just two weeks before from debuting the project after years away and four years without a single. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I assumed, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I jump on the Zoom expecting it’s all going to be positive, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ That sympathetic voice? And she continues, ‘Unfortunately but your test results have come back as aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She considered the operation frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They lead you. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but then I just strolled down with a gown on and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she notes, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? Luckily it was detected early. I underwent removal recently and my one side now appears as a odd shape.” She smiles again. “The nipple was preserved.”
The subsequent surgery is for health and appearance. Her chest, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I thought, why make it worse, I’m already having a rough time. So rude! It’s funny because I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Previous Struggles
She is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in health crises. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, acting as a reminder, or punch in the stomach, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her childhood, already beginning performing in the London theater in the production (she was chosen at the age of 9). That’s when she was diagnosed with the medical problem a syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She fast-forwards six years, and 17-year-old Jess has become part of the trio the group while attending the academy. “I signed my initial contract, 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.”
Wow, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
