You can’t imagine it, Jessie J says. There she was readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her newish partner, and at long last the mother of a toddler after struggling to conceive for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was told she had breast cancer.
The artist, real name J. Cornish, is known for speaking her mind. The album, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an candid account, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last made an album (endometrial issues, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with typical candour. The lead track, the song No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Later next release, the upbeat Living My Best Life, came out in May and Cornish was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly coping with her cancer. A month later she shared the news, and in early July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
We meet at a photography studio in the capital. She is sporting a tan faux-leather coat, jeans with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and oversized specs. Picture biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Like the film, I say, recalling the film. “They used to call me that!” She beams. She is quick, bold and direct. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is planning to attempt her standup debut soon. “I like entertaining. During performances I frequently joke about the audience.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
Cornish was getting ready for an slot at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it checked, had an ultrasound, and they were, like, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I responded, ‘However, it’s there. I’ve got an achy arm and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they said, ‘We should biopsy it?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was serious she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then she had assured herself it was okay. The way she explains it, it was inopportune to receive a diagnosis when she had a busy schedule.
“Just two weeks before from debuting the project after years away and an extended break. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom expecting it’s all going to be fine, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have shown high-grade cancer cells.’” What did you say? “I replied, ‘Well, that’s not great. The timing is terrible.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I hate being put under. They lead you. You know when you have emergency surgery you are wheeled, but this time I just marched with a medical attire and my rear exposed. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the op. “Cancer sucks, man, but however I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy recently and my right breast now looks like a odd shape.” Another grin. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is both medical and cosmetic. Her breasts, she observes, are now “uneven. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. How rude! I reflected, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. So rude! It’s funny because I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”
Past Medical Issues
Cornish is no stranger to illness. She thinks her attitude toward illness has been so optimistic because she’s used to physical challenges. They have often coincided with peak moments, functioning as a wake-up call, or shock, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Truly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”
She reminisces to her youth, already beginning performing in the London theater in the production (she was cast at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the heart condition WPW, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an IV drip, and being readmitted at night.” She fast-forwards six years, and teenage Jess has become part of the trio Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”
Hey, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
