You wouldn’t believe it, Jessie J remarks. At that moment gearing up for her first album release in eight years, deeply enamored with her current love, and finally the mom to a little one after struggling to conceive for ten years, feeling invincible. Then in March she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The musician, actual name J. Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The album, her latest release, was supposed to be an candid account, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last worked on songs (endometrial issues, losing a baby, failed relationships, emotional abuse, suicide) with characteristic openness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Then second single, Living My Best Life, debuted in May and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was thriving, while still secretly dealing with breast cancer. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” expression. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they inquire, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.
We’re at a studio in the capital. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, off-white boots and large glasses. Picture motorcycle style meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a man with facial hair.” A biker reference, I say, recalling the movie. “They used to call me that!” She beams. Cornish is quick, irreverent and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her standup debut in the coming year. “I love making people laugh. On stage I often tease the fans.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
The artist was getting ready for an slot at the Baftas when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and tingling in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was concerning she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then she had assured herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to get cancer when she had so much on.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after eight years without an album and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I thought, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in expecting it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she continues, ‘Unfortunately but your test results have shown high-grade cancer cells.’” What did you say? “I answered, ‘That’s unfortunate. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She found the surgery scary and bizarre. “I fear going under. You’re escorted. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but then I just marched with a hospital gown and my bum hanging out. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the procedure. “It’s terrible, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. I underwent removal a few months back and my one side now resembles a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The next operation is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she observes, are now “asymmetrical. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I reflected, why make it worse, I’m already having a difficult experience. Such disrespect! It’s funny because I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
Past Medical Issues
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her attitude toward illness has been so positive because she’s experienced in health crises. Many times they occur alongside career highs, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or shock, to highlight not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her youth, already making her debut featuring in the West End in a musical (she was chosen at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with 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 being readmitted at night.” She skips forward half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has joined the girl group the group while attending the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in the year 2020 I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I was unable to vocalize for a twelve months.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
