You couldn’t make it up, the singer states. At that moment preparing for her new album launch in eight years, deeply enamored with her current love, and at long last the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was diagnosed with cancer in her breast.
The artist, real name Jessica Cornish, is known for being brutally honest. The record, her latest release, was meant as an transparent story, addressing every moment of pain she’d endured since she last recorded music (endometriosis, miscarriage, failed relationships, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The first single, the song No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Then follow-up track, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and the artist was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while all the while living with her cancer. A month later she disclosed her condition, and in early July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She gives me her best “Are you kidding?” expression. “I put out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every media appearance, and they’re, like, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I answer, ‘Uh, nothing really’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s yet to undergo cosmetic procedures.
We’re at a photo studio in London. She is sporting a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with ornate white designs, beige footwear and big frames. Picture motorcycle style meets 70s singer aesthetic. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Jessie is quick, bold and direct. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is planning to attempt her standup debut next year. “I love making people laugh. When performing I basically roast the audience.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was planning an appearance at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It appears fine; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I insisted, ‘However, it’s there. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I wake up.’ And they said, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was serious she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then Cornish had convinced herself it was okay. The way she explains it, it was just bad timing to get cancer when she had so much on.
“We’re two weeks away from releasing the album after a long hiatus and no new music. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be good, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your reports have shown malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They lead you. During crises you go on a gurney, but now I just walked with a medical attire and my backside out. It felt surreal.” But, Cornish says, she’s been blessed. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Luckily it was detected early. The surgery happened a few months back and my right breast now looks like a fruit under fabric.” Another grin. “The nipple was preserved.”
The follow-up procedure is both medical and cosmetic. Her breasts, she notes, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. So inconsiderate! I reflected, no need to bully me, I’m already having a hard period. So rude! It’s funny because I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. My plans were disrupted.”
Past Medical Issues
The singer is familiar with health problems. She believes her outlook on her diagnosis has been so optimistic because she’s experienced in physical challenges. They have often coincided with career highs, functioning as a wake-up call, or punch in the stomach, to remind her not to be complacent. “Honestly, I feel fate says, ‘You having a good time? Hold on.’ From a young age, it has consistently accompanied achievements for me; something severe or obscure has happened to my health.”
She takes me back to her youth, already starting her career performing in the London theater in a musical (she was selected at the age of 9). That’s when she was told about the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an IV drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead six years, and 17-year-old Jess has entered the trio Soul Deep while studying at the performing arts school. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was ready to debut in recently I had a car crash and my larynx moved up and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Oi, I say, slow down, I can’t keep up. At just 17? She nods|agrees
