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 finally the mom to a little one after facing fertility challenges for a decade, riding high. Suddenly in March she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The musician, real name J. Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The album, the provocatively titled album, was meant as an candid account, tackling every bit of hardship she’d experienced since she last made an album (endometrial issues, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with characteristic openness. The initial release, the song No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. The cancer. Later next release, the upbeat Living My Best Life, was released in May and Cornish was talking to press about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly living with her cancer. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in July she had a mastectomy.
She gives me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s still waiting for cosmetic procedures.
We’re at a photography studio in the capital. She is dressed in a light brown synthetic jacket, blue jeans with detailed white appliqués, off-white boots and large glasses. Think rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, referencing the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. Cornish is fast-thinking, bold and filter-free. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her first comedy performance next year. “I enjoy humor. During performances I frequently joke about the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
Cornish was preparing for an slot at the awards show when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an scan, and they said, ‘It appears fine; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I responded, ‘However, it’s there. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I rise.’ And they said, ‘We should biopsy it?’ The date was March 28, the post-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 Cornish had persuaded herself it was nothing. The way she tells it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had a busy schedule.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after eight years without an album and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I thought, ‘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, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your test results have shown aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She found the surgery scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but then I just walked with a medical attire and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been blessed. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “It’s terrible, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy recently and my affected breast now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The subsequent surgery is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “uneven. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I thought, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! It’s funny because I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
The singer is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with health crises. Frequently they align with professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to highlight not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Enjoying yourself? Sit down.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside high points for me; a major or strange event has affected my well-being.”
She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already beginning featuring in the stage in the production (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the heart condition a syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has become part of the girl group Soul Deep while enrolled in the performing arts school. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in the year 2020 I had a car crash and my larynx moved up and I couldn’t sing for a twelve months.”
Oi, I say, slow down, I can’t keep up. At just 17? She nods|agrees
