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You can’t imagine it, Jessie J remarks. There she was gearing up for her comeback record in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her current love, and finally the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for a decade, riding high. Suddenly in spring she was diagnosed with breast cancer.

The singer-songwriter, actual name Jess Cornish, is known for speaking her mind. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an open book, addressing every moment of pain she’d experienced since she last recorded music (endometrial issues, losing a baby, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, suicide) with her usual frankness. The initial release, the song No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. Her diagnosis. Then second single, her song Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly coping with her cancer. A month later she went public, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.

She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they inquire, ‘Any updates?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” she has just had to call off performances because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.

We’re at a photography studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with ornate white designs, beige footwear and large glasses. Think motorcycle style meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the seventies and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” A biker reference, I say, referencing the film. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. Cornish is fast-thinking, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is planning to attempt her initial standup show in the coming year. “I like entertaining. When performing I frequently joke about the fans.”

Health Struggles and Diagnosis

The artist was planning an appearance at the Baftas when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an scan, and they said, ‘It appears fine; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘But I can feel it. I’ve got an achy arm and numbness in my fingers whenever I rise.’ And they said, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was bad news she’d reach out on the Monday. By then Cornish had assured herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to get cancer when she had so much on.

“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after a long hiatus and an extended break. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I thought, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be fine, and she goes, ‘You might want to sit.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”

I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself

She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but now I just walked with a medical attire and my bum hanging out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. I underwent removal a few months back and my right breast now resembles a odd shape.” Another grin. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”

The next operation is both medical and cosmetic. Her boobs, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. The implant is larger than before. That’s impolite! I reflected, why make it worse, I’m already having a rough time. So rude! Amusingly I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”

A History of Health Challenges

She is familiar with health problems. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with health crises. They have often coincided with peak moments, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to make her recall not to assume everything is fine. “Honestly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside high points for me; a serious or unusual issue has affected my well-being.”

She recalls to her youth, already starting her career starring in the London theater in a musical (she was chosen at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as dizziness and irregular beats. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an IV drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has joined the trio Soul Deep while enrolled in the performing arts school. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my throat was injured and I couldn’t sing for a twelve months.”

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