You can’t imagine it, the singer remarks. There she was readying for her comeback record in eight years, blissfully happy with her current love, and finally the mom to a little one after dealing with conception issues for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in spring she was told she had cancer in her breast.
The artist, actual name Jessica Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The record, her latest release, was intended as an open book, tackling every bit of hardship she’d experienced since she last made an album (endometrial issues, losing a baby, broken romances, gaslighting, suicidal thoughts) with characteristic openness. The lead track, her single No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Then next release, her song Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and she was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while at the same time living with breast cancer. Subsequently she disclosed her condition, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She gives me her best “Seriously?” glance. “I come out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they inquire, ‘What’s happening?’ and I’m, like, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s still waiting for follow-up surgery.
We meet at a photo studio in the capital. She is sporting a light brown synthetic jacket, jeans with ornate white designs, off-white boots and big frames. Picture rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, thinking of the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Cornish is sharp-witted, unfiltered and filter-free. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is hoping to make her first comedy performance next year. “I love making people laugh. On stage I often tease the crowd.”
Personal Battles and News
She was planning an slot at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and numbness in my fingers whenever I rise.’ And they suggested, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d reach out on the start of the week. By then she had convinced herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from releasing the album after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I thought, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call thinking it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your biopsy results have come back as aggressive cancer.’” What did you say? “I answered, ‘Well, that’s not great. The timing is terrible.’ 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 viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I fear going under. You’re escorted. During crises you are wheeled, but this time I just marched with a hospital gown and my rear exposed. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? Thank fuck I found it early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my affected breast now looks like a odd shape.” Another grin. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The next operation is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her chest, she remarks, are now “asymmetrical. The implant is larger than before. That’s impolite! I reflected, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Cancer ruined that plan.”
Past Medical Issues
The singer is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with physical challenges. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or shock, to highlight not to be complacent. “Truly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Enjoying yourself? Hold on.’ From a young age, it has consistently accompanied achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has happened to my health.”
She reminisces to her childhood, already beginning performing in the West End in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine). That’s when she was found to have the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a rapid pulse as well as dizziness and palpitations. “I rehearsed between visits on an intravenous line, and going back into hospital at night.” She fast-forwards half a dozen years, and young Jessica has entered the female band Soul Deep while enrolled in the performing arts school. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was about to put out music in recently I had a automobile accident and my larynx moved up and I was unable to vocalize for a twelve months.”
Wow, I say, slow down, I can’t keep up. At just 17? She nods|agrees
