You wouldn’t believe it, Jessie J remarks. At that moment readying for her first album release in eight years, ecstatically in love with her current love, and at long last the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for ten years, riding high. Then in spring she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The artist, birth name J. Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The album, her latest release, was meant as an transparent story, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d endured since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, miscarriage, broken romances, psychological manipulation, suicide) with characteristic openness. The lead track, her single No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Later second single, Living My Best Life, came out in May and the artist was speaking publicly about how she was thriving, while still secretly dealing with the disease. A month later she disclosed her condition, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “What the fuck?” expression. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to postpone shows because she’s yet to undergo cosmetic procedures.
We meet at a photo studio in the capital. She is wearing a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with ornate white designs, beige footwear and oversized specs. Imagine rocker vibe meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the 70s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” A biker reference, I say, recalling the film. “That’s what people called me at school!” She beams. She is sharp-witted, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her standup debut in the coming year. “I like entertaining. During performances I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
Cornish was preparing for an performance at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it checked, had an test, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was serious she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then she had persuaded herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to get cancer when she had many commitments.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after years away and four years without a single. And she contacted me and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I thought, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she continues, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your biopsy results have indicated high-grade cancer cells.’” What was your reaction? “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.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She considered the operation terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They lead you. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but then I just walked with a gown on and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been blessed. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “It’s terrible, but however Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my affected breast now looks like a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The subsequent surgery is for health and appearance. Her chest, she observes, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. How rude! I thought, why make it worse, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be perfect. My plans were disrupted.”
Previous Struggles
The singer is no stranger to illness. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so optimistic because she’s experienced in health crises. Many times they occur alongside career highs, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Honestly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ Since childhood, 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 making her debut featuring in the West End in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the heart condition WPW, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has entered the trio the group while studying at the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was ready to debut in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Hey, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
