You can’t imagine it, Jessie J remarks. At that moment readying for her new album launch in eight years, ecstatically in love with her current love, and finally 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 singer-songwriter, birth name Jess Cornish, is famous for speaking her mind. The record, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an candid account, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d endured since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. Her diagnosis. Then second single, her song Living My Best Life, came out in May and the artist was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while at the same time living with the disease. Four weeks after she went public, and in early July she had a mastectomy.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” glance. “I release with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving 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 cosmetic procedures.
We meet at a photo studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and oversized specs. Think motorcycle style meets vintage look. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the film. “They used to call me that!” She grins. Jessie is quick, bold and direct. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her first comedy performance next year. “I like entertaining. When performing I frequently joke about the fans.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was planning an appearance at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an test, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘However, it’s there. I’ve got an achy arm and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was bad news she’d call on the Monday. By then the singer had convinced herself it was fine. The way she describes it, it was inopportune to face illness when she had a busy schedule.
“We’re two weeks away from launching this thing after eight years without an album and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I jump on the Zoom believing it’s all going to be good, and she informs me, ‘You might want to sit.’ That sympathetic voice? And she reveals, ‘I regret to inform you but your reports have indicated aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery frightening and surreal. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. During crises you are wheeled, but then I just strolled down with a hospital gown and my bum hanging out. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been fortunate. Without chemo or radio, just the op. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my one side now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “At least the nipple remains.”
The subsequent surgery is both medical and cosmetic. Her breasts, she observes, are now “different sizes. The size doesn’t match. That’s impolite! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. How offensive! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
She is accustomed to medical issues. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so positive because she’s familiar with physical challenges. They have often coincided with peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or shock, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Hold on.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; something severe or obscure has happened to my health.”
She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already beginning performing in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was selected at the age of 9). That’s when she was found to have the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an IV drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She fast-forwards several years, and teenage Jess has joined the trio Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a year.”
Wow, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
