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You couldn’t make it up, Jessie J says. There she was readying for her comeback record in eight years, blissfully happy with her newish partner, and finally the mother of a toddler after struggling to conceive for a decade, on top of the world. Then in spring she was told she had a breast cancer diagnosis.

The singer-songwriter, birth name J. Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The album, the provocatively titled album, was supposed to be an transparent story, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last worked on songs (a gynecological condition, losing a baby, failed relationships, emotional abuse, suicide) with typical candour. The lead track, the song No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Then second single, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in May and Cornish was speaking publicly about how she was living her best life, while all the while coping with breast cancer. Subsequently she shared the news, and in July she had a mastectomy.

She gives me her best “Are you kidding?” glance. “I come out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m doing every media appearance, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” Cornish has just had to postpone shows because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.

Our interview takes place at a photo studio in London. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, jeans with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and oversized specs. Think biker chic meets vintage look. “It seems like I’m in the 70s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She smiles. Jessie is fast-thinking, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her first comedy performance soon. “I love making people laugh. During performances I frequently joke about the audience.”

Health Struggles and Diagnosis

Cornish was planning an performance at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I promptly visited to get it checked, had an scan, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; your breasts are normal.’ And I responded, ‘But I can feel it. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they suggested, ‘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 contact on the Monday. By then she had assured herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was inopportune to receive a diagnosis when she had a busy schedule.

“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after years away and no new music. 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 expecting it’s all going to be positive, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she reveals, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have indicated malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”

Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness

She found the surgery scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but then I just strolled down with a medical attire and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. Without chemo or radio, just the op. “It’s terrible, but yet I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my right breast now resembles a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “The nipple was preserved.”

The next operation is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she observes, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I reflected, no need to bully me, I’m already having a rough time. How offensive! It’s funny because I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be ideal. Cancer ruined that plan.”

Past Medical Issues

The singer is accustomed to medical issues. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in health crises. They have often coincided with professional successes, acting as a reminder, or shock, to make her recall not to be complacent. “Honestly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied moments of success for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”

She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already starting her career featuring in the stage in the production (she was cast at the age of 9). That’s when she was found to have the medical problem WPW, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has entered the girl group Soul Deep while attending the Brit School. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I was unable to vocalize for a twelve months.”

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