You can’t imagine it, the singer remarks. At that moment preparing for her comeback record in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her newish partner, and at long last the mom to a little one after struggling to conceive for ten years, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The singer-songwriter, real name Jessica Cornish, is famous for being brutally honest. The album, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an candid account, addressing every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last made an album (endometriosis, miscarriage, broken romances, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with typical candour. The lead track, No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. The illness. Then next release, Living My Best Life, came out in May and Cornish was giving interviews 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 July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She offers me her best “What the fuck?” look. “I come out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m conducting every media appearance, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I respond, ‘Uh, nothing really’” Cornish has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.
We’re at a photography studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, blue jeans with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and oversized specs. Think biker chic meets vintage look. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Easy Rider, I say, thinking of the film. “They used to call me that!” She beams. Jessie is fast-thinking, irreverent and direct. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her initial standup show next year. “I enjoy humor. When performing I basically roast the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
Cornish was getting ready for an appearance at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it examined, had an test, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘But I can feel it. I’ve got an achy arm and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they replied, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was serious she’d call on the start of the week. By then she had persuaded herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was inopportune to receive a diagnosis when she had a busy schedule.
“It was a fortnight prior from debuting the project after a long hiatus and an extended break. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom expecting it’s all going to be good, and she informs me, ‘You might want to sit.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have indicated high-grade cancer cells.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She viewed the procedure scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but then I just marched with a hospital gown 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 surgery. “It’s terrible, but yet Luckily it was detected early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my right breast now looks like a odd shape.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The subsequent surgery is for health and appearance. Her boobs, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. How rude! I felt, 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 perfectionism, and I know they’d never be flawless. My plans were disrupted.”
Previous Struggles
The singer is no stranger to illness. She believes her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside career highs, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or punch in the stomach, to remind her not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Take a seat.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; something severe or obscure has impacted my body.”
She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut featuring in the stage in a musical (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was told about the medical problem Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has joined the female band Soul Deep while attending the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in 2020 I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a year.”
Oi, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
