You can’t imagine it, the singer says. At that moment readying for her new album launch in eight years, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mom to a little one after facing fertility challenges for ten years, riding high. Then in spring she was diagnosed with cancer in her breast.
The singer-songwriter, birth name Jess Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The album, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an candid account, addressing every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last worked on songs (endometriosis, miscarriage, failed relationships, emotional abuse, suicide) with typical candour. The lead track, the song No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. Her diagnosis. Then second single, Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and the artist was talking to press about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while at the same time coping with her cancer. A month later she disclosed her condition, and in the start of summer she had a mastectomy.
She offers me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every media appearance, and they inquire, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s still waiting for follow-up surgery.
We meet at a studio in the capital. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and oversized specs. Think biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, referencing the movie. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She beams. Jessie is fast-thinking, irreverent and direct. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her initial standup show soon. “I love making people laugh. On stage I frequently joke about the fans.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was getting ready for an slot at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an scan, and they said, ‘It looks like nothing; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I responded, ‘However, it’s there. I’ve got an achy arm and numbness in my fingers whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ It happened on March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The specialist told her if it was bad news she’d call on the start of the week. By then the singer had persuaded herself it was okay. The way she explains it, it was simply too inconvenient to get cancer when she had many commitments.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after years away and an extended break. And she contacted me and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call thinking it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have come back as malignant cells.’” What was your reaction? “I answered, ‘Well, that’s not great. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She viewed the procedure scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. They lead you. During crises you go on a gurney, but then I just walked with a medical attire and my rear exposed. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “Cancer is awful, but you know what? Luckily it was detected early. The surgery happened a few months back and my affected breast now looks like a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The subsequent surgery is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her breasts, she observes, are now “uneven. The size doesn’t match. That’s impolite! I thought, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”
A History of Health Challenges
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so optimistic because she’s familiar with physical challenges. Many times they occur alongside career highs, acting as a reminder, or punch in the stomach, to highlight not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ Ever since I was a child, it has consistently accompanied achievements for me; a major or strange event has happened to my health.”
She recalls to her youth, already making her debut performing in the stage 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 rapid pulse as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an IV drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and young Jessica has joined the trio Soul Deep while studying at the performing arts school. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”
Wow, I say, wait, I need a moment. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
