You couldn’t make it up, the singer remarks. At that moment preparing for her comeback record in eight years, deeply enamored with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the mom to a little one after dealing with conception issues for ten years, riding high. Suddenly in spring she was found to have cancer in her breast.
The musician, birth name Jessica Cornish, is known for being brutally honest. The record, the provocatively titled album, was meant as an open book, addressing every moment of pain she’d endured since she last worked on songs (a gynecological condition, losing a baby, unsuccessful partnerships, emotional abuse, suicidal thoughts) with typical candour. The first single, the song No Secrets, was launched in the spring. But by then there existed a huge secret. Her diagnosis. Later next release, her song Living My Best Life, came out in May and Cornish was talking to press about how she was thriving, while at the same time coping with her cancer. Subsequently she shared the news, and in July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She offers me her best “Seriously?” glance. “I release with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m doing every media appearance, and they ask, ‘What’s happening?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” she has just had to call off performances because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.
We meet at a studio in the capital. She is dressed in a light brown synthetic jacket, denim trousers with ornate white designs, cream boots and large glasses. Imagine biker chic meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the seventies and I should have a partner with a mustache.” A biker reference, I say, referencing the movie. “They used to call me that!” She smiles. Cornish is quick, bold and filter-free. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is planning to attempt her initial standup show soon. “I love making people laugh. When performing I frequently joke about the audience.”
Personal Battles and News
She was getting ready for an slot at the awards show when she discovered a mass. “I immediately went to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; your breasts are normal.’ And I responded, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ It happened on March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was serious she’d call on the start of the week. By then she had persuaded herself it was okay. The way she tells it, it was just bad timing to get cancer when she had many commitments.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after eight years without an album and an extended break. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be fine, and she says, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your test results have come back as malignant cells.’” How did you respond? “I answered, ‘Well, that’s not great. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘My child depends on me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She found the surgery terrifying and absurd. “I hate being put under. You’re escorted. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but then I just walked with a medical attire and my rear exposed. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she adds, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Luckily it was detected early. I underwent removal four months ago and my one side now looks like a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her chest, she notes, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. So inconsiderate! I reflected, why make it worse, I’m already having a hard period. So rude! Amusingly I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got perfectionism, and I know they’d never be ideal. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
She is familiar with health problems. She believes her outlook on her diagnosis has been so upbeat because she’s used to health crises. They have often coincided with professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or shock, to highlight not to be complacent. “Truly, I feel life goes, ‘You having a good time? Sit down.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied moments of success for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”
She recalls to her 11-year-old self, already making her debut performing in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of 9). That’s when she was told about the medical problem WPW, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an drip, and returning to the hospital at night.” She jumps ahead six years, and young Jessica has joined the female band Soul Deep while studying at the academy. “I secured a deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was ready to debut in the year 2020 I had a collision and my voice box shifted and I lost my voice for a long period.”
Wow, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees