You wouldn’t believe it, the singer states. There she was readying for her comeback record in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her newish partner, and at long last the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, riding high. Then in spring she was diagnosed with a breast cancer diagnosis.
The singer-songwriter, real name Jess Cornish, is known for speaking her mind. The LP, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was intended as an candid account, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d endured since she last made an album (endometriosis, losing a baby, broken romances, gaslighting, suicidal thoughts) with typical candour. The first single, the song No Secrets, was released in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. The cancer. Then next release, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and Cornish was speaking publicly about how she was thriving, while all the while dealing with the disease. A month later she disclosed her condition, and in the start of summer she received surgical treatment.
She shoots me her best “What the fuck?” look. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m giving every interview, and they inquire, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I’m, like, ‘Well, not much…’” Cornish has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.
Our interview takes place at a photography studio in London. She is wearing a beige fake-leather jacket, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and large glasses. Imagine rocker vibe meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “As if I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the picture. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. Jessie is fast-thinking, irreverent and blunt. She says she has always been interested in humor and is hoping to make her initial standup show soon. “I love making people laugh. During performances I frequently joke about the audience.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
She was getting ready for an appearance at the Baftas when she discovered a mass. “I promptly visited to get it checked, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It looks like nothing; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. I’ve got an achy arm and numbness in my fingers whenever I rise.’ And they suggested, ‘How about a biopsy?’ The date was March 28, the following my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The doctor told her if it was serious she’d reach out on the Monday. By then she had assured herself it was fine. The way she explains it, it was simply too inconvenient to get cancer when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from debuting the project after a long hiatus and no new music. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I join the call thinking it’s all going to be good, and she informs me, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ The solemn tone? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘That’s unfortunate. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
Some men find me challenging due to my self-awareness
She viewed the procedure terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. During crises you go on a gurney, but now I just marched with a hospital gown and my rear exposed. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, she adds, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the op. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? I’m grateful it was caught soon. The surgery happened recently and my one side now looks like a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The subsequent surgery is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she remarks, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. So inconsiderate! I thought, why make it worse, I’m already having a rough time. So rude! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. Cancer ruined that plan.”
A History of Health Challenges
Cornish is familiar with health problems. She thinks her attitude toward illness has been so positive because she’s used to medical emergencies. They have often coincided with career highs, functioning as a wake-up call, or punch in the stomach, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Frankly, I feel life goes, ‘Things going well? Take a seat.’ Ever since I was a child, it has consistently accompanied moments of success for me; something severe or obscure has happened to my health.”
She reminisces to her 11-year-old self, already starting her career starring in the West End in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine). That’s when she was diagnosed with the medical problem WPW, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as lightheadedness and palpitations. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She skips forward half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has joined the girl group Soul Deep while studying at the Brit School. “I secured a deal, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in recently I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a twelve months.”
Oi, I say, wait, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
