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You can’t imagine it, Jessie J states. At that moment readying for her first album release in eight years, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for ten years, on top of the world. Then in spring she was diagnosed with breast cancer.

The artist, birth name Jess Cornish, is famous for being brutally honest. The album, her latest release, was supposed to be an transparent story, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d endured since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, unsuccessful partnerships, psychological manipulation, mental health struggles) with characteristic openness. The lead track, No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Later second single, her song Living My Best Life, came out in May and the artist was speaking publicly about how she was living her best life, while all the while coping with the disease. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in early July she received surgical treatment.

She gives me her best “Seriously?” look. “I release with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Well, not much…’” Cornish has just had to postpone shows because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.

Our interview takes place at a photography studio in London. She is sporting a light brown synthetic jacket, blue jeans with detailed white appliqués, off-white boots and oversized specs. Imagine biker chic meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Easy Rider, I say, thinking of the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She grins. Jessie is quick, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is planning to attempt her standup debut soon. “I like entertaining. When performing I basically roast the crowd.”

Health Struggles and Diagnosis

Cornish was getting ready for an performance at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I immediately went to get it examined, had an scan, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I was, like, ‘But I can feel it. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they said, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was concerning she’d reach out on the Monday. By then the singer had convinced herself it was fine. The way she explains it, it was simply too inconvenient to get cancer when she had many commitments.

“We’re two weeks away from launching this thing after a long hiatus and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I thought, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I join the call thinking it’s all going to be fine, and she says, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your biopsy results have indicated malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I replied, ‘That’s unfortunate. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”

Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness

She considered the operation terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They lead you. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but then I just walked with a hospital gown and my bum hanging out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she notes, she’s been fortunate. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy recently and my affected breast now resembles a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”

The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I felt, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. Cancer ruined that plan.”

Previous Struggles

Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so optimistic because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. They have often coincided with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or shock, to highlight not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; something severe or obscure has happened to my health.”

She takes me back to her childhood, already beginning starring in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She skips forward six years, and 17-year-old Jess has become part of the female band Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was ready to debut in 2020 I had a car crash and my larynx moved up and I lost my voice for a year.”

Hey, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees