You can’t imagine it, the singer says. There she was preparing for her first album release in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her current love, and at long last the mother of a toddler after struggling to conceive for a decade, on top of the world. Then in March she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The artist, real name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The LP, her latest release, was intended as an candid account, addressing every moment of pain she’d faced since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, broken romances, psychological manipulation, suicidal thoughts) with characteristic openness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Then second single, Living My Best Life, debuted in May and she was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while at the same time coping with the disease. A month later she shared the news, and in the start of summer she had a mastectomy.
She offers me her best “What the fuck?” look. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they ask, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I respond, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.
We’re at a photography studio in London. She is sporting a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and big frames. Think rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, thinking of the film. “They used to call me that!” She smiles. Jessie is sharp-witted, irreverent and direct. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is planning to attempt her standup debut soon. “I enjoy humor. When performing I often tease the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
The artist was getting ready for an slot at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I responded, ‘Yet I sense it. My arm hurts and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ The date was March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was concerning she’d call on the Monday. By then Cornish had persuaded herself it was fine. The way she tells it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had many commitments.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after years away and no new music. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I log in expecting it’s all going to be positive, and she goes, ‘You might want to sit.’ The solemn tone? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your reports have indicated malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. That’s not fucking great timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She considered the operation terrifying and absurd. “I fear going under. They lead you. During crises you roll down in a bed, but now I just marched with a hospital gown and my rear exposed. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been fortunate. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the op. “Cancer sucks, man, but however I’m grateful it was caught soon. The surgery happened recently and my affected breast now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The subsequent surgery is both medical and cosmetic. Her breasts, she notes, are now “uneven. The implant is larger than before. That’s impolite! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a hard period. Such disrespect! It’s funny because I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
Past Medical Issues
She is familiar with health problems. She feels her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s experienced in physical challenges. Frequently they align with professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to highlight not to take anything for granted. “Honestly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”
She takes me back to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut performing in the stage in a musical (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead several years, and teenage Jess has joined the trio Soul Deep while attending the Brit School. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was ready to debut in recently I had a automobile accident and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Hey, I say, slow down, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
