You wouldn’t believe it, the singer says. At that moment gearing up for her comeback record in eight years, blissfully happy with her current love, and finally the mom to a little one after facing fertility challenges for a decade, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The singer-songwriter, actual name Jessica Cornish, is renowned for being brutally honest. The album, her latest release, was meant as an candid account, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d endured since she last made an album (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, failed relationships, emotional abuse, suicidal thoughts) with typical candour. The lead track, No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. The cancer. Then second single, the upbeat Living My Best Life, debuted in May and she was speaking publicly about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while all the while dealing with her cancer. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in the start of summer she had a mastectomy.
She shoots me her best “Seriously?” look. “I put out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m conducting every media appearance, and they inquire, ‘Any updates?’ and I answer, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” the singer has just had to postpone shows because she’s still waiting for follow-up surgery.
Our interview takes place at a photography studio in the capital. She is wearing a light brown synthetic jacket, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and oversized specs. Imagine biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” Like the film, I say, recalling the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. She is fast-thinking, irreverent and filter-free. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her standup debut in the coming year. “I enjoy humor. On stage I frequently joke about the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
The artist was planning an performance at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I immediately went to get it examined, had an scan, and they said, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I responded, ‘But I can feel it. I have arm pain and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they said, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d contact on the start of the week. By then Cornish had convinced herself it was nothing. The way she tells it, it was simply too inconvenient to face illness when she had many commitments.
“Just two weeks before from releasing the album after eight years without an album and an extended break. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I thought, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be positive, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have shown malignant cells.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘That’s unfortunate. That’s not fucking great timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I fear going under. They walk you down. During crises you are wheeled, but now I just strolled down with a medical attire and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been fortunate. Without chemo or radio, just the op. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy a few months back and my one side now resembles a fruit under fabric.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The next operation is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her chest, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I felt, no need to bully me, I’m already having a rough time. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
She is familiar with health problems. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so positive because she’s experienced in health crises. Frequently they align with peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or blow, to highlight not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Enjoying yourself? 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 recalls to her childhood, already beginning starring in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She fast-forwards half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has joined the trio Soul Deep while studying at the performing arts school. “I secured a deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”
Oi, I say, slow down, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
