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You can’t imagine it, Jessie J states. There she was preparing for her first album release in eight years, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for a decade, riding high. Suddenly in spring she was told she had cancer in her breast.

The musician, actual name J. Cornish, is renowned for being brutally honest. The record, her latest release, was intended as an open book, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last recorded music (endometriosis, pregnancy loss, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The lead track, the song No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Later next release, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and she was talking to press about how she was thriving, while all the while coping with breast cancer. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in July she received surgical treatment.

She shoots me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I put out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m doing every media appearance, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I’m, like, ‘Well, not much…’” Cornish has just had to postpone shows because she’s awaiting reconstructive surgery.

We’re at a photo studio in the capital. She is dressed in a light brown synthetic jacket, blue jeans with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and oversized specs. Think rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the 70s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, recalling the film. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. She is sharp-witted, irreverent and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her initial standup show next year. “I love making people laugh. When performing I frequently joke about the fans.”

Personal Battles and News

She was planning an appearance at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it checked, had an test, and they said, ‘It seems benign; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘But I can feel it. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I wake up.’ And they said, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was concerning she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then Cornish had assured herself it was okay. The way she tells it, it was simply too inconvenient to receive a diagnosis when she had many commitments.

“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after a long hiatus and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in expecting it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have come back as malignant cells.’” How did you respond? “I answered, ‘That’s unfortunate. 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 considered the operation frightening and surreal. “I hate being put under. They lead you. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but now I just marched with a medical attire and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been blessed. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but however Luckily it was detected early. I had the mastectomy recently and my one side now appears as a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”

The subsequent surgery is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she observes, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. How rude! I reflected, no need to bully me, I’m already having a rough time. So rude! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”

A History of Health Challenges

The singer is familiar with health problems. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. They have often coincided with career highs, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or blow, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Hold on.’ From a young age, it has consistently accompanied achievements for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”

She recalls to her youth, already starting her career starring in the stage in the production (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the medical problem WPW, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an IV drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has entered the trio Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my voice box shifted and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”

Wow, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees