You wouldn’t believe it, Jessie J states. At that moment preparing for her new album launch in eight years, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for ten years, riding high. Then in spring she was told she had cancer in her breast.
The musician, birth name Jess Cornish, is renowned for being brutally honest. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was supposed to be an candid account, tackling every bit of hardship she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometriosis, miscarriage, failed relationships, emotional abuse, suicidal thoughts) with characteristic openness. The lead track, her single No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Then next release, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while at the same time living with her cancer. A month later she disclosed her condition, and in early July she had a mastectomy.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” look. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they’re, like, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s still waiting for cosmetic procedures.
We meet at a photography studio in the capital. She is wearing a beige fake-leather jacket, denim trousers with elaborate white patches, beige footwear and oversized specs. Imagine rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Easy Rider, I say, thinking of the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She beams. Jessie is sharp-witted, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her initial standup show soon. “I love making people laugh. During performances I frequently joke about the audience.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was planning an slot at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I immediately went to get it looked at, had an ultrasound, and they said, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I responded, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d call on the start of the week. By then she had assured herself it was nothing. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to face illness when she had many commitments.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after eight years without an album and no new music. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I thought, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I log in thinking it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. The timing is terrible.’ My initial thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She considered the operation scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. You know when you have emergency surgery you are wheeled, but then I just strolled down with a gown on and my bum hanging out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the procedure. “Cancer is awful, but however Luckily it was detected early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my right breast now resembles a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “uneven. 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 difficult experience. How offensive! It’s funny because I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. Illness changed that.”
Previous Struggles
She is no stranger to illness. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so optimistic because she’s used to medical emergencies. Frequently they align with professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or shock, to remind her not to be complacent. “Truly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘You having a good time? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; something severe or obscure has impacted my body.”
She recalls to her youth, already beginning performing in the stage in a musical (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was diagnosed with the cardiac issue a syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and being readmitted at night.” She fast-forwards half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has joined the female band the group while enrolled in the academy. “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 collision and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a year.”
Wow, I say, slow down, I can’t keep up. At just 17? She nods|agrees
