You couldn’t make it up, the singer remarks. There she was gearing up for her new album launch in eight years, blissfully happy with her newish partner, and at long last the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for a decade, feeling invincible. Then in spring she was found to have a breast cancer diagnosis.
The musician, birth name J. Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was supposed to be an transparent story, tackling every moment of pain she’d experienced since she last recorded music (endometrial issues, miscarriage, failed relationships, gaslighting, suicidal thoughts) with typical candour. The first single, her single No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The cancer. Later second single, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in May and Cornish was giving interviews about how she was thriving, while at the same time coping with the disease. Subsequently she went public, and in July she received surgical treatment.
She offers me her best “Are you kidding?” look. “I come out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I answer, ‘Uh, nothing really’” the singer has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s awaiting follow-up surgery.
We meet at a photo studio in the capital. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and large glasses. Imagine biker chic meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the 70s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, thinking of the movie. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She grins. Cornish is sharp-witted, irreverent and direct. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her standup debut next year. “I love making people laugh. On stage I often tease the fans.”
Personal Battles and News
Cornish was getting ready for an appearance at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I promptly visited to get it looked at, had an test, and they said, ‘It appears fine; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘But I can feel it. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘How about a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the post-birthday.” It was a Friday. The doctor told her if it was concerning she’d contact on the start of the week. By then she had assured herself it was fine. The way she tells it, it was inopportune to get cancer when she had a busy schedule.
“Just two weeks before from debuting the project after years away and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I was, like, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call expecting it’s all going to be positive, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your test results have shown aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. 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 found the surgery frightening and surreal. “I fear going under. You’re escorted. In urgent cases you are wheeled, but then I just walked 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 op. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Thank fuck I found it early. I underwent removal recently and my affected breast now appears as a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” She smiles again. “At least the nipple remains.”
The follow-up procedure is both medical and cosmetic. Her boobs, she observes, are now “asymmetrical. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. So inconsiderate! I felt, why make it worse, I’m already having a difficult experience. Such disrespect! Ironically I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. Illness changed that.”
A History of Health Challenges
The singer is no stranger to illness. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s used to medical emergencies. Frequently they align with peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or punch in the stomach, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Honestly, I feel life goes, ‘Enjoying yourself? Hold on.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside high points for me; something severe or obscure has affected my well-being.”
She recalls to her childhood, already beginning starring in the London theater in Whistle Down the Wind (she was selected at the age of nine). That’s when she was found to have the heart condition WPW, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as vertigo and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and young Jessica has become part of the girl group the group while enrolled in the Brit School. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a car crash and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Oi, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees
