You can’t imagine it, the singer states. There she was preparing for her new album launch in eight years, blissfully happy with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for ten years, riding high. Suddenly in March she was told she had breast cancer.
The singer-songwriter, real name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The record, her latest release, was meant as an candid account, tackling every moment of pain she’d endured since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, miscarriage, broken romances, psychological manipulation, suicide) with characteristic openness. The lead track, the song No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Later follow-up track, Living My Best Life, came out in May and the artist was talking to press about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly coping with the disease. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” look. “I release with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m conducting every media appearance, and they inquire, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to call off performances because she’s awaiting reconstructive surgery.
Our interview takes place at a studio in London. She is sporting a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with detailed white appliqués, off-white boots and oversized specs. Imagine rocker vibe meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, thinking of the movie. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She smiles. She is quick, irreverent and direct. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her standup debut next year. “I like entertaining. During performances I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
The artist was getting ready for an appearance at the awards show when she found a lump. “I immediately went to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they said, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they said, ‘We should biopsy it?’ It happened on March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor 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 simply too inconvenient to receive a diagnosis when she had many commitments.
“It was a fortnight prior from releasing the album after a long hiatus and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I jump on the Zoom believing it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your biopsy results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. The timing is terrible.’ My initial thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I hate being put under. You’re escorted. You know when you have emergency surgery you go on a gurney, but now I just walked with a gown on and my rear exposed. It felt surreal.” But, Cornish says, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the procedure. “Cancer is awful, but yet Luckily it was detected early. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my one side now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” Another grin. “The nipple was preserved.”
The subsequent surgery is both medical and cosmetic. Her breasts, she observes, are now “different sizes. The implant is larger than before. So inconsiderate! I felt, why make it worse, I’m already having a rough time. So rude! It’s funny because I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
Past Medical Issues
The singer is no stranger to illness. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so positive because she’s experienced in physical challenges. They have often coincided with peak moments, functioning as a wake-up call, or blow, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has often paired with moments of success for me; something severe or obscure has impacted my body.”
She recalls to her childhood, already starting her career featuring in the West End in the production (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the medical problem WPW, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She skips forward half a dozen years, and young Jessica has become part of the girl group Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was about to put out music in recently I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Hey, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
