You can’t imagine it, Jessie J remarks. There she was gearing up for her comeback record in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her current love, and at long last the mom to a little one after struggling to conceive for a decade, riding high. Then in spring she was told she had breast cancer.
The singer-songwriter, real name Jess Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was meant as an open book, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last made an album (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, broken romances, psychological manipulation, mental health struggles) with characteristic openness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. The illness. Later follow-up track, the upbeat Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and the artist was speaking publicly about how she was thriving, 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 “What the fuck?” expression. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every media appearance, and they’re, like, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” Cornish has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo cosmetic procedures.
We meet at a studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, blue jeans with elaborate white patches, beige footwear and big frames. Picture rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, thinking of the movie. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She smiles. She is fast-thinking, bold and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her standup debut in the coming year. “I like entertaining. When performing I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
The artist was planning an appearance at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it checked, had an scan, and they were, like, ‘It seems benign; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they said, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the post-birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The specialist told her if it was serious she’d reach out on the Monday. By then she had assured herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to face illness when she had so much on.
“We’re two weeks away from releasing the album after eight years without an album and an extended break. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom thinking it’s all going to be positive, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘Unfortunately but your test results have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. 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 considered the operation frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but then I just walked with a hospital gown and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “It’s terrible, but however Thank fuck I found it early. The surgery happened recently and my affected breast now resembles a odd shape.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she notes, are now “different sizes. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I thought, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. So rude! 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 perfect. My plans were disrupted.”
Past Medical Issues
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s used to health crises. Frequently they align with professional successes, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or shock, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Truly, I feel fate says, ‘Enjoying yourself? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside high points for me; something severe or obscure has impacted my body.”
She reminisces to her youth, already starting her career performing in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was selected at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the medical problem WPW, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward several years, and teenage Jess has entered the female band the group while studying at the performing arts school. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was about to put out music in recently I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I lost my voice for a long period.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
