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You can’t imagine it, the singer states. At that moment preparing for her new album launch in nearly a decade, blissfully happy with her newish partner, and at long last the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for a decade, feeling invincible. Then in March she was found to have breast cancer.

The artist, birth name Jess Cornish, is famous for being brutally honest. The record, the provocatively titled album, was meant as an candid account, tackling every bit of hardship she’d endured since she last recorded music (a gynecological condition, losing a baby, broken romances, psychological manipulation, suicide) with her usual frankness. The initial release, the song No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there remained a major undisclosed truth. The illness. Then next release, her song Living My Best Life, debuted in late spring and Cornish was talking to press about how she was enjoying life to the fullest, while all the while living with her cancer. Four weeks after she went public, and in the start of summer she underwent breast removal surgery.

She gives me her best “Are you kidding?” expression. “I come out with a song called No Secrets. I’m conducting every press talk, and they inquire, ‘Any updates?’ and I respond, ‘Uh, nothing really’” Cornish has just had to call off performances because she’s yet to undergo cosmetic procedures.

We meet at a photo studio in London. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, denim trousers with detailed white appliqués, cream boots and large glasses. Picture rocker vibe meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the 1970s and I should have a partner with a mustache.” A biker reference, I say, thinking of the movie. “That’s what people called me at school!” She smiles. Cornish is sharp-witted, irreverent and direct. She says she has always been interested in humor and is aiming for her first comedy performance soon. “I love making people laugh. On stage I frequently joke about the fans.”

Medical Challenges and Discovery

Cornish was getting ready for an slot at the Baftas when she noticed an abnormality. “I immediately went to get it examined, had an scan, and they told me, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I responded, ‘However, it’s there. I have arm pain and tingling in my hands whenever I wake up.’ And they replied, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the following my birthday.” It was a Friday. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d call on the Monday. By then the singer had convinced herself it was nothing. The way she describes it, it was simply too inconvenient to face illness when she had a busy schedule.

“Just two weeks before from releasing the album after years away and no new music. And she contacted me and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘A video call, likely minor.’ So I join the call expecting it’s all going to be positive, and she informs me, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she reveals, ‘I’m so, so sorry but your reports have come back as malignant cells.’” What did you say? “I answered, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘I have to survive for my boy.’”

I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself

She viewed the procedure scary and bizarre. “I hate being put under. They walk you down. In urgent cases you go on a gurney, but then I just marched with a gown on and my rear exposed. It felt surreal.” But, she adds, she’s been lucky. No chemo, no radiotherapy, just the op. “It’s terrible, but yet Luckily it was detected early. I underwent removal four months ago and my right breast now looks like a grapefruit under a tight bedsheet.” A further beam. “The nipple was preserved.”

The subsequent surgery is both medical and cosmetic. Her boobs, she remarks, are now “different sizes. The implant is larger than before. How rude! I thought, no need to bully me, I’m already having a difficult experience. How offensive! It’s funny because I said I’d not undergo augmentation because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be perfect. Illness changed that.”

Past Medical Issues

She is accustomed to medical issues. She believes her perspective on the cancer has been so positive because she’s used to health crises. Many times they occur alongside peak moments, functioning as a wake-up call, or punch in the stomach, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Truly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Sit down.’ Ever since I was a child, it has often paired with achievements for me; a serious or unusual issue has impacted my body.”

She reminisces to her youth, already making her debut performing in the West End in Whistle Down the Wind (she was chosen at the age of nine years old). That’s when she was found to have the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a fast heartbeat as well as lightheadedness and irregular beats. “I was going in and out of rehearsals on an drip, and being readmitted at night.” She fast-forwards half a dozen years, and 17-year-old Jess has entered the female band Soul Deep while attending the performing arts 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 voice box shifted and I was unable to vocalize for a twelve months.”

Hey, I say, hold on, I need a moment. You really had a stroke at 17? She nods|agrees