You can’t imagine it, the singer remarks. At that moment preparing for her first album release in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her current love, and at long last the mom to a little one after dealing with conception issues for ten years, on top of the world. Suddenly in March she was told she had cancer in her breast.
The musician, birth name Jessica Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The album, her latest release, was meant as an transparent story, dealing with every moment of pain she’d endured since she last made an album (endometriosis, miscarriage, broken romances, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with characteristic openness. The initial release, the song No Secrets, was released in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Later follow-up track, Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while at the same time coping with breast cancer. Subsequently she disclosed her condition, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She offers me her best “Seriously?” expression. “I put out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every interview, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” Cornish has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo cosmetic procedures.
We’re at a studio in London. She is sporting a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with ornate white designs, beige footwear and big frames. Imagine biker chic meets vintage look. “As if 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 smiles. She is sharp-witted, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her first comedy performance next year. “I like entertaining. On stage I often tease the crowd.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was preparing for an slot at the Baftas when she found a lump. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It appears fine; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘However, it’s there. I have arm pain and tingling in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they said, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was serious she’d contact on the start of the week. By then the singer had assured herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had so much on.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after years away and an extended break. And she contacted me and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I thought, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be fine, and she says, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have shown high-grade cancer cells.’” What did you say? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. That’s not fucking great timing.’ The first thing I thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She considered the operation terrifying and absurd. “I fear going under. You’re escorted. During crises you are wheeled, but now I just marched with a medical attire and my bum hanging out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she notes, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “It’s terrible, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. I had the mastectomy recently and my right breast now resembles a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she notes, are now “uneven. The implant is larger than before. So inconsiderate! I thought, don’t add insult to injury, I’m already having a rough time. Such disrespect! It’s funny because I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be ideal. Illness changed that.”
Past Medical Issues
She is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s used to health crises. They have often coincided with peak moments, acting as a reminder, or blow, to make her recall not to be complacent. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has consistently accompanied moments of success for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”
She takes me back to her youth, already making her debut starring in the London theater in the production (she was selected at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as vertigo and irregular beats. “I rehearsed between visits 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 enrolled in the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a car crash and my voice box shifted and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
