You couldn’t make it up, the singer remarks. At that moment preparing for her first album release in eight years, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mom to a little one after facing fertility challenges for ten years, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
The artist, birth name J. Cornish, is famous for telling it as it is. The record, the provocatively titled album, was meant as an transparent story, dealing with every bit of hardship she’d experienced since she last made an album (endometrial issues, losing a baby, failed relationships, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with typical candour. The first single, No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there existed a huge secret. The illness. Then next release, the upbeat Living My Best Life, came out in late spring and she was giving interviews about how she was living her best life, while still secretly dealing with the disease. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in early July she received surgical treatment.
She shoots me her best “Seriously?” glance. “I release with a song called No Secrets. I’m doing every press talk, and they’re, like, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I’m, like, ‘Uh, nothing really’” the singer has just had to postpone shows because she’s yet to undergo follow-up surgery.
We meet at a photo studio in London. She is dressed in a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with detailed white appliqués, beige footwear and big frames. Picture biker chic meets vintage look. “I feel like I’m in the seventies and I should have a man with facial hair.” Easy Rider, I say, recalling the picture. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She smiles. Cornish is quick, unfiltered and filter-free. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is hoping to make her initial standup show in the coming year. “I enjoy humor. When performing I basically roast the fans.”
Medical Challenges and Discovery
The artist was getting ready for an performance at the ceremony when she noticed an abnormality. “I quickly sought to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they were, like, ‘It looks like nothing; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘Yet I sense it. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they said, ‘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 serious she’d contact on the start of the week. By then she had persuaded herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had a busy schedule.
“Just two weeks before from launching this thing after eight years without an album and an extended break. And she [the doctor] texted and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I assumed, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be positive, and she goes, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your biopsy results have indicated aggressive cancer.’” What was your reaction? “I said, ‘That’s unfortunate. What awful timing.’ Immediately I felt was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She considered the operation terrifying and absurd. “I dislike anesthesia. You’re escorted. You know when you have emergency surgery you are wheeled, but this time I just marched with a gown on and my bum hanging out. Like a dystopian scene.” But, she notes, she’s been lucky. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “It’s terrible, but however Luckily it was detected early. I had the mastectomy four months ago and my one side now appears as a fruit under fabric.” Another grin. “At least the nipple remains.”
The next operation is for health and appearance. Her breasts, she notes, are now “different sizes. The implant is larger than before. So inconsiderate! I felt, no need to bully me, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
Cornish is familiar with health problems. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s used to physical challenges. Frequently they align with career highs, acting as a reminder, or punch in the stomach, to remind her not to assume everything is fine. “Honestly, I feel fate says, ‘Enjoying yourself? Take a seat.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside high points for me; something severe or obscure has impacted my body.”
She takes me back to her youth, already making her debut featuring in the stage in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine). That’s when she was told about the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and palpitations. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an intravenous line, and returning to the hospital at night.” She skips forward several years, and teenage Jess has joined the girl group the group while attending the Brit School. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a stroke. Then when I was planning to release songs in the year 2020 I had a collision and my larynx moved up and I lost my voice for a year.”
Hey, I say, wait, I can’t keep up. A stroke so young? She nods|agrees
