You can’t imagine it, the singer says. There she was preparing for her new album launch in eight years, blissfully happy with her current love, and finally the mother of a toddler after struggling to conceive for a decade, on top of the world. Suddenly in spring she was found to have breast cancer.
The singer-songwriter, actual name Jess Cornish, is known for telling it as it is. The LP, her latest release, was meant as an open book, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last made an album (endometriosis, losing a baby, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The lead track, No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Then second single, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in May and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while still secretly dealing with breast cancer. A month later she went public, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” expression. “I come out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I’m, like, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” the singer has just had to postpone shows because she’s yet to undergo follow-up surgery.
Our interview takes place at a photo studio in the capital. She is dressed in a beige fake-leather jacket, jeans with ornate white designs, off-white boots and large glasses. Picture rocker vibe meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, thinking of the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Jessie is fast-thinking, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always been interested in humor and is planning to attempt her first comedy performance in the coming year. “I enjoy humor. On stage I often tease the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was planning an performance at the awards show when she found a lump. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an test, and they said, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘However, it’s there. My arm hurts and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they replied, ‘We should biopsy it?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d call on the start of the week. By then Cornish had assured herself it was okay. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to face illness when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from debuting the project after years away and an extended break. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I thought, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in expecting it’s all going to be fine, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘Unfortunately but your test results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I said, ‘That’s unfortunate. What awful timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
Men have called me difficult because I’m a strong person who understands who I am
She considered the operation frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. During crises you roll down in a bed, but this time I just strolled down with a medical attire and my rear exposed. It felt surreal.” But, she notes, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but however Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my right breast now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” Another grin. “The nipple was preserved.”
The next operation is both medical and cosmetic. Her chest, she notes, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I felt, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
Past Medical Issues
She is familiar with health problems. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so optimistic because she’s familiar with physical challenges. Frequently they align with professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or shock, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied high points for me; a serious or unusual issue has happened to my health.”
She reminisces to her youth, already making her debut starring in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of 9). That’s when she was told about the medical problem WPW, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She fast-forwards six years, and teenage Jess has become part of the girl group Soul Deep while enrolled in the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a collision and my throat was injured and I couldn’t sing for a year.”
Wow, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
