You wouldn’t believe it, the singer says. There she was gearing up for her comeback record in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her newish partner, and at long last the parent to a young child after struggling to conceive for ten years, feeling invincible. Then in March she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The singer-songwriter, birth name Jessica Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The album, the provocatively titled album, was supposed to be an open book, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, losing a baby, broken romances, gaslighting, suicide) with characteristic openness. The first single, No Secrets, was released in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Later follow-up track, her song Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while all the while coping with the disease. Subsequently she went public, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I put out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every interview, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to postpone shows because she’s awaiting cosmetic procedures.
We’re at a photography studio in the capital. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and big frames. Think biker chic meets 70s singer aesthetic. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, referencing the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. She is sharp-witted, unfiltered and filter-free. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her standup debut soon. “I enjoy humor. When performing I frequently joke about the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
The artist was planning an appearance at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an ultrasound, and they were, like, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘But I can feel it. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was bad news she’d contact on the Monday. By then Cornish had persuaded herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had a busy schedule.
“Just two weeks before from debuting the project after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I thought, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I jump on the Zoom thinking it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ The solemn tone? And she says, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have indicated malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I answered, ‘That’s unfortunate. The timing is terrible.’ My initial thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She considered the operation frightening and surreal. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but this time I just walked with a gown on and my rear exposed. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, she adds, she’s been fortunate. Without chemo or radio, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? Luckily it was detected early. The surgery happened a few months back and my one side now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “The nipple was preserved.”
The subsequent surgery is both medical and cosmetic. Her chest, she observes, are now “uneven. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I reflected, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. Such disrespect! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”
A History of Health Challenges
Cornish is familiar with health problems. She feels her outlook on her diagnosis has been so positive because she’s experienced in health crises. They have often coincided with professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or shock, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ Ever since I was a child, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”
She recalls to her youth, already beginning featuring in the West End in a musical (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was told about the medical problem WPW, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as lightheadedness and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an IV drip, and being readmitted at night.” She jumps ahead six years, and 17-year-old Jess has entered the trio the group while attending the performing arts school. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was planning to release songs in the year 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Wow, I say, hold on, I need a moment. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
