You can’t imagine it, the singer states. At that moment gearing up for her first album release in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and finally the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for ten years, feeling invincible. Then in March she was diagnosed with a breast cancer diagnosis.
The singer-songwriter, birth name Jess Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The album, the provocatively titled album, was meant as an open book, tackling every moment of pain she’d endured since she last made an album (endometriosis, miscarriage, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The lead track, her single No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Later follow-up track, the upbeat Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and she was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while all the while coping with breast cancer. Subsequently she disclosed her condition, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “Are you kidding?” look. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Well, not much…’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s still waiting for reconstructive surgery.
We’re at a studio in London. She is wearing a light brown synthetic jacket, denim trousers with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and oversized specs. Picture motorcycle style meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Jessie is quick, bold and blunt. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is hoping to make her standup debut soon. “I enjoy humor. During performances I basically roast the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
Cornish was planning an performance at the awards show when she noticed an abnormality. “I immediately went to get it examined, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was concerning she’d contact on the Monday. By then Cornish had convinced herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to get cancer when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after years away and an extended break. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call thinking it’s all going to be positive, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she continues, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your test results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She viewed the procedure scary and bizarre. “I fear going under. They walk you down. During crises you roll down in a bed, but now I just strolled down with a medical attire and my bum hanging out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she notes, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Luckily it was detected early. The surgery happened recently and my right breast now appears as a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is both medical and cosmetic. Her boobs, she remarks, are now “uneven. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I felt, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Previous Struggles
The singer is no stranger to illness. She feels her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s used to medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, acting as a reminder, or shock, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside moments of success for me; something severe or obscure has affected my well-being.”
She takes me back to her childhood, already starting her career starring in the West End in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was diagnosed with the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as vertigo and irregular beats. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She jumps ahead six years, and teenage Jess has become part of the trio Soul Deep while attending the performing arts school. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Wow, I say, wait, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
