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You wouldn’t believe it, Jessie J says. At that moment readying for her comeback record in eight years, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for a decade, riding high. Suddenly in spring she was diagnosed with a breast cancer diagnosis.

The musician, actual name Jessica Cornish, is known for being brutally honest. The album, the provocatively titled album, was supposed to be an candid account, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last made an album (endometriosis, losing a baby, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The initial release, No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Later follow-up track, her song Living My Best Life, came out in May and she was speaking publicly about how she was living her best life, while still secretly coping with her cancer. Subsequently she disclosed her condition, and in the start of summer she underwent breast removal surgery.

She offers me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every media appearance, and they inquire, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s still waiting for follow-up surgery.

We meet at a studio in the capital. She is sporting a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and large glasses. Imagine rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a man with facial hair.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the movie. “That’s what people called me at school!” She beams. Cornish is fast-thinking, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her initial standup show in the coming year. “I love making people laugh. When performing I often tease the crowd.”

Medical Challenges and Discovery

The artist was preparing for an slot at the Baftas when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ It happened on March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d call on the start of the week. By then she had convinced herself it was fine. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had many commitments.

“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after eight years without an album and an extended break. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in expecting it’s all going to be fine, and she says, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your test results have shown aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. The timing is terrible.’ My initial thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”

Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness

She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. During crises you go on a gurney, but now I just strolled down with a gown on and my rear exposed. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. Without chemo or radio, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my affected breast now resembles a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”

The next operation is both medical and cosmetic. Her breasts, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. How rude! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a hard period. So rude! Amusingly I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. Cancer ruined that plan.”

Past Medical Issues

Cornish is no stranger to illness. She thinks her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in physical challenges. Frequently they align with career highs, acting as a reminder, or punch in the stomach, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ From a young age, it has consistently accompanied high points for me; a serious or unusual issue has affected my well-being.”

She takes me back to her childhood, already starting her career starring in the West End in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue a syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward six years, and young Jessica has entered the female band Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a stroke. Then when I was about to put out music in recently I had a collision and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a year.”

Wow, I say, slow down, I need a moment. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees