You can’t imagine it, Jessie J states. At that moment readying for her new album launch in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her newish partner, and at long last the mom to a little one after struggling to conceive for a decade, riding high. Then in March she was told she had cancer in her breast.
The artist, actual name Jessica Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The album, her latest release, was supposed to be an candid account, addressing every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, suicidal thoughts) with typical candour. The lead track, No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Later follow-up track, the upbeat Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while all the while dealing with the disease. Subsequently she went public, and in early July she had a mastectomy.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I put out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to postpone shows because she’s yet to undergo follow-up surgery.
We’re at a studio in the capital. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with elaborate white patches, cream boots and oversized specs. Picture motorcycle style meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” A biker reference, I say, referencing the film. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. Cornish is sharp-witted, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her first comedy performance soon. “I enjoy humor. When performing I frequently joke about the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was planning an slot at the Baftas when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an test, and they told me, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I responded, ‘But I can feel it. I have arm pain and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they suggested, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was serious she’d call on the Monday. By then she had assured herself it was fine. The way she explains it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had a busy schedule.
“Just two weeks before from releasing the album after eight years without an album and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I thought, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be positive, and she says, ‘You might want to sit.’ That sympathetic voice? And she reveals, ‘Unfortunately but your test results have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” What did you say? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. The timing is terrible.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She viewed the procedure terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. You know when you have emergency surgery you go on a gurney, but this time I just marched with a medical attire and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, Cornish says, she’s been blessed. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but however I’m grateful it was caught soon. The surgery happened four months ago and my one side now resembles a fruit under fabric.” She smiles again. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is both medical and cosmetic. Her chest, she observes, are now “different sizes. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, 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 perfectionism, and I know they’d never be perfect. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
She is familiar with health problems. She feels her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in health crises. Frequently they align with career highs, functioning as a wake-up call, or punch in the stomach, to make her recall not to assume everything is fine. “Honestly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Take a seat.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; something severe or obscure has impacted my body.”
She reminisces to her childhood, already starting her career performing in the West End in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the medical problem Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I rehearsed between visits on an IV drip, and being readmitted at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and young Jessica has joined the girl group Soul Deep while studying at the academy. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a automobile accident and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a long period.”
Wow, I say, wait, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
