‘It has taught me to embrace life more’: Jessica Cornish on her health battle, comebacks and cracking China

You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J says. At that moment preparing for her first album release in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her newish partner, and finally the mom to a little one after struggling to conceive for ten years, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was found to have breast cancer.

The musician, birth name Jess Cornish, is renowned for being brutally honest. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was meant as an transparent story, dealing with every moment of pain she’d endured since she last made an album (endometrial issues, miscarriage, broken romances, gaslighting, suicide) with characteristic openness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. Her diagnosis. Later next release, Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was thriving, while at the same time coping with the disease. Subsequently she went public, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.

She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” expression. “I come out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m conducting every media appearance, and they ask, ‘Any updates?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” Cornish has just had to postpone shows because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.

Our interview takes place at a studio in the capital. She is sporting a light brown synthetic jacket, blue jeans with detailed white appliqués, off-white boots and oversized specs. Think rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She grins. She is quick, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her initial standup show in the coming year. “I enjoy humor. When performing I frequently joke about the fans.”

Medical Challenges and Discovery

She was getting ready for an slot at the Baftas when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they said, ‘It looks like nothing; 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 rise.’ And they said, ‘How about a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was concerning she’d reach out on the Monday. By then Cornish had assured herself it was nothing. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to face illness when she had many commitments.

“We’re two weeks away from launching this thing after a long hiatus and an extended break. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have come back as aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”

I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself

She viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. You’re escorted. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but now I just marched with a gown on and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “Cancer is awful, but however Luckily it was detected early. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my affected breast now looks like a odd shape.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”

The next operation is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she remarks, are now “uneven. The implant is larger than before. So inconsiderate! I thought, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! It’s funny because I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”

Previous Struggles

The singer is no stranger to illness. She feels her outlook on her diagnosis has been so optimistic because she’s experienced in medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or punch in the stomach, to highlight 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 impacted my body.”

She recalls to her 11-year-old self, already beginning starring in the stage in a musical (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was diagnosed with the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I rehearsed between visits on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She fast-forwards half a dozen years, and young Jessica has become part of the girl group Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a automobile accident and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a year.”

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