You wouldn’t believe it, the singer states. There she was readying for her new album launch in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her newish partner, and finally the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for a decade, riding high. Then in spring she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The singer-songwriter, actual name Jessica Cornish, is famous for being brutally honest. The record, her latest release, was intended as an open book, dealing with every moment of pain she’d endured since she last made an album (endometriosis, losing a baby, broken romances, psychological manipulation, suicide) with characteristic openness. The lead track, No Secrets, was released in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. Her diagnosis. Later follow-up track, the upbeat Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and she was talking to press about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while at the same time living with the disease. A month later she shared the news, and in early July she had a mastectomy.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every interview, and they’re, like, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” the singer has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo cosmetic procedures.
Our interview takes place at a studio in the capital. She is wearing a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and large glasses. Think rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, referencing the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Cornish is quick, irreverent and direct. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her first comedy performance soon. “I like entertaining. On stage I frequently joke about the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
Cornish was planning an appearance at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an test, and they said, ‘It appears fine; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I was, like, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was serious she’d call on the Monday. By then Cornish had persuaded herself it was okay. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to receive a diagnosis when she had many commitments.
“Just two weeks before from debuting the project after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I assumed, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I jump on the Zoom believing it’s all going to be fine, and she says, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ That sympathetic voice? And she continues, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have indicated high-grade cancer cells.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. That’s not fucking great timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She considered the operation frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They lead you. You know when you have emergency surgery you are wheeled, but now I just marched with a medical attire and my bum hanging out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, she adds, she’s been blessed. Without chemo or radio, just the op. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. I underwent removal a few months back and my one side now resembles a odd shape.” She smiles again. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she notes, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. How rude! I reflected, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be flawless. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Past Medical Issues
Cornish is no stranger to illness. She believes her attitude toward illness has been so positive because she’s used to physical challenges. They have often coincided with career highs, acting as a reminder, or blow, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Honestly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Take a seat.’ Ever since I was a child, it has consistently accompanied moments of success for me; a serious or unusual issue has affected my well-being.”
She recalls to her youth, already making her debut starring in the stage in the production (she was cast at the age of nine). That’s when she was found to have the medical problem a syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an intravenous line, and being readmitted at night.” She skips forward several years, and teenage Jess has joined the girl group Soul Deep while attending the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a car crash and my throat was injured and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
