You wouldn’t believe it, the singer states. At that moment gearing up for her comeback record in eight years, blissfully happy with her recent boyfriend, and finally the parent to a young child after dealing with conception issues for a decade, riding high. Suddenly in March she was found to have breast cancer.
The artist, birth name Jessica Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an transparent story, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last recorded music (endometrial issues, losing a baby, broken romances, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The first single, No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Then follow-up track, the upbeat Living My Best Life, was released in late spring and she was giving interviews about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly dealing with breast cancer. Subsequently she shared the news, and in July she had a mastectomy.
She shoots me her best “Seriously?” expression. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I’m, like, ‘Well, not much…’” the singer has just had to postpone shows because she’s yet to undergo follow-up surgery.
We’re at a photography studio in London. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and large glasses. Imagine motorcycle style meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Like the film, I say, thinking of the movie. “They used to call me that!” She smiles. She is sharp-witted, unfiltered and direct. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her first comedy performance soon. “I enjoy humor. During performances I frequently joke about the fans.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
Cornish was getting ready for an appearance at the awards show when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it checked, had an test, and they said, ‘It seems benign; your tissue is healthy.’ And I was, like, ‘However, it’s there. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they said, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was concerning she’d contact on the Monday. By then she had assured herself it was fine. The way she explains it, it was just bad timing to get cancer when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after a long hiatus and an extended break. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I log in expecting it’s all going to be fine, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she continues, ‘I regret to inform you but your test results have shown aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I answered, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. The timing is terrible.’ My initial 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 found the surgery frightening and surreal. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. You know when you have emergency surgery you are wheeled, but then I just marched with a gown on and my backside out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “It’s terrible, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. I underwent removal four months ago and my one side now looks like a fruit under fabric.” Another grin. “The nipple was preserved.”
The subsequent surgery is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she observes, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. So inconsiderate! I felt, why make it worse, I’m already having a rough time. How offensive! It’s funny because I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be ideal. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Past Medical Issues
The singer is no stranger to illness. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so optimistic because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or punch in the stomach, to highlight not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Enjoying yourself? Take a seat.’ Since childhood, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has affected my well-being.”
She reminisces to her youth, already beginning starring in the London theater in the production (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was found to have the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She skips forward several years, and teenage Jess has entered the girl group Soul Deep while studying at the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was planning to release songs in the year 2020 I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I was unable to vocalize for a long period.”
Wow, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
