You can’t imagine it, the singer states. At that moment readying for her first album release in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her newish partner, and at long last the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in spring she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The musician, birth name Jessica Cornish, is known for speaking her mind. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was meant as an open book, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last worked on songs (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, emotional abuse, suicide) with her usual frankness. The first single, No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. 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 all the while living with her cancer. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” expression. “I put out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every media appearance, and they’re, like, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” the singer has just had to postpone shows because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.
Our interview takes place at a photo studio in the capital. She is dressed in a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and large glasses. Picture biker chic meets 70s singer aesthetic. “It seems like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the movie. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She beams. Cornish is fast-thinking, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her standup debut soon. “I like entertaining. When performing I basically roast the crowd.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
Cornish was planning an performance at the Baftas when she noticed an abnormality. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an test, and they said, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I responded, ‘Yet I sense it. I’ve got an achy arm and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they said, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was serious she’d call on the Monday. By then Cornish had persuaded herself it was fine. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after years away and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I thought, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom thinking it’s all going to be fine, and she says, ‘You might want to sit.’ The solemn tone? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have come back as malignant cells.’” What did you say? “I replied, ‘Well, that’s not great. The timing is terrible.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She considered the operation frightening and surreal. “I fear going under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but then I just strolled down with a hospital gown and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been blessed. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but however Luckily it was detected early. I underwent removal a few months back and my affected breast now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” Another grin. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The subsequent surgery is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she notes, are now “uneven. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I thought, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
The singer is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s used to physical challenges. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, acting as a reminder, or blow, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Truly, I feel fate says, ‘You having a good time? Take a seat.’ Ever since I was a child, it has consistently accompanied high points for me; a major or strange event has affected my well-being.”
She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut starring in the West End in Whistle Down the Wind (she was selected at the age of 9). That’s when she was diagnosed with the medical problem WPW, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an IV drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She fast-forwards half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has joined the female band the group while attending the performing arts school. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in recently I had a collision and my throat was injured and I couldn’t sing for a twelve months.”
Wow, I say, slow down, I need a moment. At just 17? She nods|agrees
