You can’t imagine it, the singer says. At that moment preparing for her comeback record in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her current love, and at long last the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was told she had cancer in her breast.
The musician, birth name J. Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The record, her latest release, was supposed to be an candid account, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d faced since she last made an album (a gynecological condition, pregnancy loss, unsuccessful partnerships, psychological manipulation, suicide) with her usual frankness. The first single, her single No Secrets, was released in April. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. Her diagnosis. Later next release, the upbeat Living My Best Life, came out in May and the artist was giving interviews about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while still secretly coping with her cancer. A month later she went public, and in the start of summer she had a mastectomy.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every interview, and they’re, like, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Erm, yeah, nothing …’” the singer has just had to postpone shows because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
Our interview takes place at a studio in the capital. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with elaborate white patches, cream boots and oversized specs. Picture biker chic meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Like the film, I say, recalling the film. “They used to call me that!” She grins. Cornish is quick, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her standup debut soon. “I like entertaining. When performing I frequently joke about the crowd.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
Cornish was preparing for an slot at the awards show when she found a lump. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; your tissue is healthy.’ And I responded, ‘But I can feel it. My arm hurts and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they said, ‘How about a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d call on the Monday. By then Cornish had assured herself it was fine. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to receive a diagnosis when she had many commitments.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after eight years without an album and four years without a single. And she contacted me and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I thought, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I log in expecting it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she reveals, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I replied, ‘Well, that’s not great. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt 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 viewed the procedure terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. They lead you. You know when you have emergency surgery you go on a gurney, but then I just walked with a medical attire and my backside out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been blessed. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the op. “Cancer is awful, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. The surgery happened recently and my affected breast now resembles a fruit under fabric.” Another grin. “At least the nipple remains.”
The follow-up procedure is both medical and cosmetic. Her breasts, she remarks, are now “different sizes. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I thought, no need to bully me, I’m already having a hard period. Such disrespect! Amusingly I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be perfect. My plans were disrupted.”
Previous Struggles
Cornish is accustomed to medical issues. She feels her attitude toward illness has been so upbeat because she’s familiar with medical emergencies. They have often coincided with peak moments, acting as a reminder, or punch in the stomach, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Frankly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Enjoying yourself? Hold on.’ From a young age, it has consistently accompanied high points for me; a major or strange event has affected my well-being.”
She reminisces to her youth, already starting her career performing in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an intravenous line, and going back into hospital at night.” She fast-forwards several years, and young Jessica has entered the female band the group while enrolled in the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was ready to debut in recently I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a long period.”
Hey, I say, wait, I can’t keep up. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
