You wouldn’t believe it, the singer remarks. At that moment preparing for her comeback record in nearly a decade, ecstatically in love with her recent boyfriend, and at long last the mother of a toddler after dealing with conception issues for ten years, feeling invincible. Suddenly in spring she was found to have a breast cancer diagnosis.
The singer-songwriter, real name J. Cornish, is known for being brutally honest. The LP, the provocatively titled album, was intended as an transparent story, dealing with every ounce of devastation she’d endured since she last made an album (endometriosis, losing a baby, unsuccessful partnerships, gaslighting, mental health struggles) with characteristic openness. The initial release, the song No Secrets, was launched in April. But by then there was a mighty secret. Her diagnosis. Later next release, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while all the while coping with her cancer. A month later she went public, and in July she had a mastectomy.
She shoots me her best “Seriously?” glance. “I release with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m giving every interview, and they’re, like, ‘What’s happening?’ and I respond, ‘Well, not much…’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s awaiting reconstructive surgery.
We meet at a studio in the capital. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with ornate white designs, cream boots and oversized specs. Imagine biker chic meets 1970s Nana Mouskouri. “I feel like I’m in the 70s and I should have a man with facial hair.” Like the film, I say, recalling the film. “I was nicknamed that in school!” She beams. She is fast-thinking, unfiltered and filter-free. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is aiming for her standup debut in the coming year. “I enjoy humor. On stage I basically roast the crowd.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was planning an performance at the ceremony when she found a lump. “I quickly sought to get it examined, had an ultrasound, and they said, ‘It seems benign; you’ve got really good dense breast tissue.’ And I responded, ‘But I can feel it. I have arm pain and pins and needles in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they suggested, ‘We should biopsy it?’ The date was March 28, the day after my birthday.” It was a Friday. The specialist told her if it was concerning she’d contact on the Monday. By then she had convinced herself it was okay. The way she describes it, it was just bad timing to receive a diagnosis when she had so much on.
“Just two weeks before from releasing the album after years away and four years without a single. And she contacted me and said, ‘Can you talk at six?’ And I was, like, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I log in believing it’s all going to be fine, and she says, ‘Please take a seat.’ That sympathetic voice? And she says, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your biopsy results have shown high-grade cancer cells.’” What was your reaction? “I replied, ‘Well, that’s not great. The timing is terrible.’ My initial thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She viewed the procedure terrifying and absurd. “I fear going under. They lead you. You know when you have emergency surgery you go on a gurney, but now I just marched with a gown on and my rear exposed. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, she adds, she’s been blessed. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but however Thank fuck I found it early. I underwent removal four months ago and my right breast now resembles a odd shape.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The subsequent surgery is both medical and cosmetic. Her chest, she notes, are now “different sizes. They didn’t do an implant as small as my original. That’s impolite! I reflected, no need to bully me, I’m already having a hard period. How offensive! Ironically I said I’d never get my boobs done because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”
Past Medical Issues
She is familiar with health problems. She feels her attitude toward illness has been so optimistic because she’s used to health crises. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, serving as a tap on the shoulder, or shock, to make her recall not to take anything for granted. “Honestly, I feel life goes, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ From a young age, it has always gone alongside achievements for me; a major or strange event has impacted my body.”
She takes me back to her youth, already making her debut starring in the West End in the production (she was selected at the age of 9). That’s when she was found to have the cardiac issue Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as vertigo and irregular beats. “I rehearsed between visits on an drip, and going back into hospital at night.” She jumps ahead half a dozen years, and teenage Jess has become part of the trio Soul Deep while attending the academy. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a brain incident. Then when I was planning to release songs in 2020 I had a car crash and my larynx moved up and I couldn’t sing for a year.”
Oi, I say, wait, I am overwhelmed. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees
