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You wouldn’t believe it, Jessie J says. At that moment preparing for her comeback record in eight years, ecstatically in love with her current love, and finally the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for ten years, feeling invincible. Suddenly in spring she was diagnosed with breast cancer.

The artist, birth name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for being brutally honest. The album, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an candid account, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d endured since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, gaslighting, suicide) with typical candour. The first single, her single No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The cancer. Later follow-up track, the upbeat Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and the artist was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while all the while coping with her cancer. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in July she had a mastectomy.

She shoots me her best “Seriously?” look. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every media appearance, and they inquire, ‘Any updates?’ and I respond, ‘Uh, nothing really’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting reconstructive surgery.

We’re at a photography studio in London. She is sporting a beige fake-leather jacket, blue jeans with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and big frames. Think rocker vibe meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, recalling the film. “They used to call me that!” She smiles. She is quick, bold and blunt. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her initial standup show soon. “I enjoy humor. When performing I basically roast the fans.”

Medical Challenges and Discovery

She was getting ready for an performance at the Baftas when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it checked, had an test, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I insisted, ‘But I can feel it. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘How about a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d call on the Monday. By then Cornish had assured herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.

“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after eight years without an album and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I jump on the Zoom expecting it’s all going to be fine, and she says, ‘You might want to sit.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have shown high-grade cancer cells.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. The timing is terrible.’ My initial thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”

Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness

She viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I fear going under. They walk you down. During crises you are wheeled, but now I just strolled down with a gown on and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, she adds, she’s been fortunate. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Luckily it was detected early. The surgery happened four months ago and my one side now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”

The subsequent surgery is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her chest, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. The implant is larger than before. So inconsiderate! I reflected, no need to bully me, I’m already having a rough time. How offensive! It’s funny because I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”

Past Medical Issues

The singer is no stranger to illness. She feels her outlook on her diagnosis has been so optimistic because she’s used to health crises. They have often coincided with career highs, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or punch in the stomach, to highlight not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel fate says, ‘You having a good time? Take a seat.’ From a young age, it has often paired with high points for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”

She takes me back to her youth, already starting her career performing in the London theater in a musical (she was chosen at the age of 9). That’s when she was told about the heart condition a syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and teenage Jess has become part of the female band Soul Deep while enrolled in the Brit School. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was about to put out music in recently I had a car crash and my larynx moved up and I was unable to vocalize for a twelve months.”

Wow, I say, slow down, I need a moment. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees