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You can’t imagine it, Jessie J says. There she was preparing for her new album launch in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mother of a toddler after facing fertility challenges for ten years, riding high. Suddenly in spring she was diagnosed with cancer in her breast.

The musician, birth name Jess Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an transparent story, addressing every bit of hardship she’d experienced since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, gaslighting, suicide) with her usual frankness. The lead track, her single No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. Her diagnosis. Then next release, the upbeat Living My Best Life, debuted in May and the artist was speaking publicly about how she was living her best life, while at the same time living with her cancer. Subsequently she disclosed her condition, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.

She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” expression. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they inquire, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” Cornish has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s awaiting reconstructive surgery.

Our interview takes place at a studio in the capital. She is sporting a beige fake-leather jacket, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, off-white boots and big frames. Picture biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, thinking of the movie. “They used to call me that!” She grins. Jessie is sharp-witted, unfiltered and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her first comedy performance in the coming year. “I love making people laugh. On stage I basically roast the audience.”

Personal Battles and News

She was planning an appearance at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I responded, ‘However, it’s there. I’ve got an achy arm and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was serious she’d call on the start of the week. By then she had persuaded herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.

“We’re two weeks away from launching this thing after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be positive, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘Unfortunately but your test results have come back as high-grade cancer cells.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. The timing is terrible.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”

I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself

She considered the operation terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They lead you. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but this time I just strolled down with a hospital gown and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, Cornish says, she’s been blessed. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the procedure. “Cancer is awful, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my one side now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “At least the nipple remains.”

The follow-up procedure is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she notes, are now “uneven. The implant is larger than before. So inconsiderate! I thought, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a difficult experience. So rude! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. Cancer ruined that plan.”

Previous Struggles

The singer is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her outlook on her diagnosis has been so optimistic because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. Frequently they align with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or blow, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘Enjoying yourself? Take a seat.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside high points for me; a serious or unusual issue has happened to my health.”

She reminisces to her childhood, already making her debut starring in the West End in the production (she was selected at the age of 9). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as lightheadedness and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead six years, and teenage Jess has become part of the female band Soul Deep while enrolled in the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was ready to debut in 2020 I had a automobile accident and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a twelve months.”

Hey, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees