You can’t imagine it, Jessie J states. At that moment readying for her new album launch in eight years, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mom to a little one after facing fertility challenges for ten years, feeling invincible. Then in March she was diagnosed with a breast cancer diagnosis.
The musician, birth name Jessica Cornish, is famous for being brutally honest. The record, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an open book, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last made an album (endometriosis, losing a baby, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, suicidal thoughts) with typical candour. The first single, No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. Her diagnosis. Then next release, Living My Best Life, came out in May and the artist was speaking publicly about how she was living her best life, while at the same time coping with breast cancer. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “Are you kidding?” expression. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every media appearance, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” Cornish has just had to postpone shows because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
Our interview takes place at a photography studio in London. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and oversized specs. Think motorcycle style meets 70s singer aesthetic. “I feel like I’m in the 70s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, thinking of the movie. “That’s what people called me at school!” She beams. She is fast-thinking, unfiltered and filter-free. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her initial standup show next year. “I like entertaining. When performing I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was planning an performance at the awards show when she noticed an abnormality. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an scan, and they said, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I insisted, ‘However, it’s there. I’ve got an achy arm and numbness in my fingers whenever I wake up.’ And they suggested, ‘How about a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The specialist told her if it was concerning she’d call on the start of the week. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was fine. The way she tells it, it was just bad timing to get cancer when she had so much on.
“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after a long hiatus and no new music. 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 expecting it’s all going to be positive, and she informs me, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she reveals, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have indicated high-grade cancer cells.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They lead you. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but then I just strolled down with a hospital gown and my rear exposed. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been blessed. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but however I’m grateful it was caught soon. The surgery happened four months ago and my right breast now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The subsequent surgery is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her chest, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I felt, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. So rude! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be flawless. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Past Medical Issues
The singer is familiar with health problems. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s used to health crises. They have often coincided with peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or punch in the stomach, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Truly, I feel fate says, ‘Enjoying yourself? Sit down.’ Ever since I was a child, it has consistently accompanied achievements for me; a major or strange event has affected my well-being.”
She reminisces to her youth, already beginning starring in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the cardiac issue WPW, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She fast-forwards several years, and young Jessica has entered the female band the group while attending the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a collision and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Wow, I say, hold on, I need a moment. At just 17? She nods|agrees
