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You couldn’t make it up, the singer says. At that moment preparing for her comeback record in eight years, blissfully happy with her recent boyfriend, and finally the mom to a little one after facing fertility challenges for a decade, feeling invincible. Suddenly in March she was found to have a breast cancer diagnosis.

The musician, birth name Jessica Cornish, is famous for being brutally honest. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an transparent story, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d experienced since she last made an album (endometrial issues, miscarriage, failed relationships, psychological manipulation, suicidal thoughts) with characteristic openness. The initial release, the song No Secrets, was dropped in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. The cancer. Later next release, Living My Best Life, debuted in May and she was speaking publicly about how she was living her best life, while all the while coping with her cancer. Four weeks after she shared the news, and in early July she received surgical treatment.

She gives me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I release with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every interview, and they inquire, ‘So what’s new with you?’ and I answer, ‘Well, not much…’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s yet to undergo reconstructive surgery.

We meet at a photography studio in the capital. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with elaborate white patches, beige footwear and oversized specs. Think motorcycle style meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “It seems like I’m in the 1970s and I should have a man with facial hair.” A biker reference, I say, referencing the movie. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She smiles. Cornish is fast-thinking, irreverent and blunt. She says she has always wanted to try comedy and is aiming for her first comedy performance in the coming year. “I like entertaining. When performing I frequently joke about the audience.”

Medical Challenges and Discovery

The artist was getting ready for an appearance at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an ultrasound, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I responded, ‘But I can feel it. I’ve got an achy arm and pins and needles in my hands whenever I get up.’ And they suggested, ‘How about a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the post-birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was concerning she’d contact on the start of the week. By then Cornish had persuaded herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was inopportune to face illness when she had so much on.

“We’re two weeks away from debuting the project after years away and four years without a single. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Are you free at six?’ And I assumed, ‘Oh, it’s a Zoom, it won’t be anything.’ So I join the call believing it’s all going to be fine, and she informs me, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she continues, ‘Unfortunately but your biopsy results have shown malignant cells.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘Oh, that’s not ideal, is it?. What awful timing.’ My initial thought 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 scary and bizarre. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. In urgent cases you roll down in a bed, but this time I just marched 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 chemo, no radiotherapy, just the procedure. “Cancer sucks, man, but you know what? Luckily it was detected early. The surgery happened a few months back and my one side now resembles a fruit under fabric.” Another grin. “At least the nipple remains.”

The next operation is both medical and cosmetic. Her chest, she notes, are now “uneven. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I reflected, no need to bully me, I’m already having a hard period. Such disrespect! Ironically I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got OCD, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”

Previous Struggles

She is familiar with health problems. She thinks her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s experienced in physical challenges. Frequently they align with peak moments, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or blow, to highlight not to be complacent. “Frankly, I feel fate says, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has consistently accompanied achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”

She takes me back to her youth, already beginning starring in the stage in a musical (she was cast at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was told about the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as vertigo and heart flutters. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an IV drip, and being readmitted at night.” She jumps ahead six years, and 17-year-old Jess has entered the female band Soul Deep while studying at the Brit School. “I just got my first record deal, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was about to put out music in the year 2020 I had a car crash and my larynx moved up and I lost my voice for a year.”

Hey, I say, hold on, I am overwhelmed. At just 17? She nods|agrees