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You can’t imagine it, Jessie J remarks. There she was readying for her comeback record in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for a decade, feeling invincible. Then in spring she was diagnosed with a breast cancer diagnosis.

The singer-songwriter, actual name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for speaking her mind. The record, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an open book, dealing with every moment of pain she’d endured since she last made an album (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with typical candour. The initial release, the song No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Then second single, the upbeat Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while at the same time dealing with the disease. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in early July she received surgical treatment.

She shoots me her best “Are you kidding?” look. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I answer, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” Cornish has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.

Our interview takes place at a photo studio in the capital. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with ornate white designs, beige footwear and oversized specs. Think biker chic meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the 70s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Easy Rider, I say, referencing the film. “That’s what people called me at school!” She grins. She is sharp-witted, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her first comedy performance in the coming year. “I like entertaining. On stage I frequently joke about the crowd.”

Medical Challenges and Discovery

The artist was preparing for an slot at the Baftas when she discovered a mass. “I immediately went to get it examined, had an scan, and they said, ‘It appears fine; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I was, like, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and numbness in my fingers whenever I wake up.’ And they said, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d call on the start of the week. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was inopportune to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.

“We’re two weeks away from releasing the album after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom thinking it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘You might want to sit.’ The solemn tone? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have come back as aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘That’s unfortunate. The timing is terrible.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘My child depends on me.’”

I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself

She considered the operation scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but then I just strolled down with a medical attire and my bum hanging out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but however Luckily it was detected early. I had the mastectomy recently and my right breast now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”

The next operation is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she notes, are now “different sizes. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I felt, no need to bully me, I’m already having a hard period. Such disrespect! It’s funny because I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. Cancer ruined that plan.”

Past Medical Issues

The singer is familiar with health problems. She believes her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with health crises. Many times they occur alongside peak moments, functioning as a wake-up call, or shock, to highlight not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”

She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already starting her career performing in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was cast at the age of 9). That’s when she was found to have the medical problem WPW, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an IV drip, and being readmitted at night.” She skips forward six years, and young Jessica has become part of the trio Soul Deep while attending the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I couldn’t sing for a year.”

Oi, I say, slow down, I can’t keep up. At just 17? She nods|agrees