You can’t imagine it, Jessie J states. There she was preparing for her comeback record in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her current love, and at long last the parent to a young child after struggling to conceive for ten years, feeling invincible. Then in March she was diagnosed with a breast cancer diagnosis.
The artist, actual name J. Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an candid account, addressing every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last recorded music (endometrial issues, losing a baby, broken romances, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with characteristic openness. The lead track, No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The cancer. Then second single, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and she was giving interviews about how she was thriving, while still secretly coping with her cancer. A month later she disclosed her condition, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She shoots me her best “Seriously?” look. “I release with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every media appearance, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” the singer has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.
Our interview takes place at a photography studio in London. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and oversized specs. Picture biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Like the film, I say, referencing the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Cornish is fast-thinking, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is aiming for her standup debut soon. “I enjoy humor. During performances I frequently joke about the fans.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
The artist was preparing for an slot at the Baftas when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they said, ‘How about a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d call on the Monday. By then Cornish had assured herself it was fine. The way she tells it, it was just bad timing to receive a diagnosis when she had many commitments.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after years away and four years without a single. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be fine, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have shown aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. You’re escorted. During crises you roll down in a bed, but then I just marched with a hospital gown and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she notes, she’s been blessed. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the procedure. “Cancer is awful, but however Luckily it was detected early. The surgery happened four months ago and my one side now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her chest, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I thought, no need to bully me, I’m already having a difficult experience. Such disrespect! Amusingly I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be flawless. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Past Medical Issues
Cornish is no stranger to illness. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in medical emergencies. They have often coincided with peak moments, acting as a reminder, or punch in the stomach, to remind her not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has consistently accompanied achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”
She takes me back to her childhood, already beginning featuring in the West End in the production (she was cast at the age of 9). That’s when she was found to have the medical problem Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and 17-year-old Jess has entered the female band the group while enrolled in the Brit School. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a collision and my larynx moved up and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”
Oi, I say, wait, I need a moment. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
