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You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J remarks. There she was readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her newish partner, and at long last the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for a decade, riding high. Suddenly in March she was told she had a breast cancer diagnosis.

The singer-songwriter, real name Jessica Cornish, is known for being brutally honest. The record, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an candid account, dealing with every moment of pain she’d faced since she last recorded music (endometrial issues, losing a baby, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with typical candour. The first single, the song No Secrets, was released in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. The illness. Later follow-up track, her song Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and Cornish was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while all the while coping with breast cancer. Subsequently she disclosed her condition, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.

She shoots me her best “Seriously?” expression. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they inquire, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” Cornish has just had to postpone shows because she’s still waiting for cosmetic procedures.

We meet at a photo studio in the capital. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and oversized specs. Think rocker vibe meets vintage look. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, recalling the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. She is fast-thinking, irreverent and direct. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her initial standup show in the coming year. “I love making people laugh. During performances I often tease the crowd.”

Medical Challenges and Discovery

The artist was getting ready for an appearance at the Baftas when she noticed an abnormality. “I immediately went to get it examined, had an test, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I responded, ‘However, it’s there. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was bad news she’d contact on the start of the week. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was fine. The way she describes it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.

“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after eight years without an album and an extended break. And she contacted me and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be fine, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have come back as malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”

Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness

She viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but then I just marched with a medical attire and my rear exposed. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the op. “It’s terrible, but however Thank fuck I found it early. The surgery happened four months ago and my affected breast now resembles a fruit under fabric.” Another grin. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”

The subsequent surgery is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “uneven. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. How rude! I thought, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. Such disrespect! It’s funny because I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be flawless. Cancer ruined that plan.”

Previous Struggles

She is familiar with health problems. She feels her outlook on her diagnosis has been so optimistic because she’s used to health crises. Frequently they align with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or punch in the stomach, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Take a seat.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”

She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut performing in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was cast at the age of 9). That’s when she was diagnosed with the medical problem WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as lightheadedness and palpitations. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead six years, and young Jessica has entered the trio Soul Deep while enrolled in the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”

Hey, I say, wait, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees