"Once Upon A Time"

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Hi to all my fellow sluts and you closeted freaks out there. My name is Dale Edward Sullivan-Driver-Kiefer-Perrault, and I want to welcome you to "My Fucked Up Fairytale". So once upon a time, there was this little person who hated everything about themselves, genuinely did not want to exist, understood from a very young age that they came from a family that was very fucked up. And I know they say your mother is your first love or whatever, but my mom was not. My mom was born physically and developmentally disabled.

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She was bedridden for the majority of my life, and I never got that connection that you feel with your mom, and that you see on TV and in real life. And I just felt different. I felt like an alien. I come from bum fuck middle of nowhere, Florida.

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They call it the heartland, and we were once known as the pickle capital of the world.

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Very country, very backwoods. I am Native American, Mexican and Irish, which is like the most intense combo. I'm very intense, very passionate, but I'm also very compassionate and I also love so much. And I know that also comes from my mom. And it took me a long time to realize just how much my mother meant to me and who she was in my life and the values she taught me, along with my grandmother, who literally was my favorite human on the face of this planet.

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Like, we loved Elvis together, we danced together, she would make me breakfast and just love on me. She made me feel safe and secure.

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And so my childhood was unique. I was born as the ward of the state, which just means that you're born into foster care. And basically what happened was my mom was given the option of adopting me out.

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Probably would have been private. And so she had a friend that she loved dearly that was quote unquote, normal. No one's normal. Nothing is normal. Everything is temporary.

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And decided she was going to adopt me out to this person. And right before I was born, this person was shot and killed at a convenience store that she worked at by a person who had just gotten released from jail.

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Such a catch 22 when I think about it, and you'll hear it later on, but there's so much like, connection to just, like, life and what happens and what people go through. Anyway, my mom was left with no other option than putting herself into a nursing home so I could go home with my grandmother and become a ward of the state, have regular visits and check ins, which if you grew up in foster care, you know it's shit. You're treated like your garbage because you're given a garbage bag to go from home to home and you just feel like shit and garbage. And so my grandmother became my guardian and I'm so glad that she did because she did not get it right in her first marriage. And I know that I never met my grandfather.

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He died before or after I was born, I don't know. I don't really know my life.

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What I do know is my grandmother loved me unconditionally, which is what I've always wanted my whole life. And I never thought I had it because I looked at everyone around me and I was focused on everyone else and what they had, and I did it in comparison. And so I did create this fairy tale fantasy world where I would disconnect either through listening to music and dancing, being out in nature and pretending I was a Disney princess, discovering life and my hopeful fairy tale prince.

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I also believe that those thoughts generated a passion within me to always make sure that I give back and do the best I can for other people.

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And I wish I would have known how much my mom loved me my whole life. It would have saved a lot of trauma, a lot of dollars on therapy. But we don't know what we don't know, and we seek to know what we want to know. And I think my biggest purpose and passion in life is to help people realize that being honest and being true to yourself is way cool. Loving yourself is way cool because it opens the doors to finding you're happily ever after.

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Or for me, my third time is a charm. And I think that regardless of where we come from, just because I have lived both lives where people don't realize that I come from true poverty. Where my mattress was on the ground, no sheets, just a little blanket, maybe a pillow, sleeping on cots within Department of Children and Families, which was what it was called when I was a kid, Children's Services, whatever. And being okay with that and realizing that it doesn't make you less human, although you may feel less human, what it does is it should spark an opportunity for you to speak up and speak your truth. Because living on the other side, where I've been around wealth, I've been around people who come from a certain type of class that I used to dream about and now no longer envy because it's just as fucked up as mine.

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But seeing that we're all the same, we just have to love more, we have to accept more. We have to open ourselves up. Coming from religious trauma, one of my favorite things that I still carry on with me is fellowship.

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And fellowship to me means coming alongside someone, befriending them, understanding them, connecting with them, sharing in one another's burden, burdens, opening up and just being yourself and being free to be honest and authentic. And we don't have that in this world. And it breaks my heart because I did have that. I am who I am because of who I came from. And it may have led me down a path of a fucked up love journey where I have been addicted to sex.

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And realizing that I also was addicted to the rape after my uncle moved in, which is my next chapter, really changed everything for me. I was six when I first remembered what happened and him being so drunk and that nasty breath on my neck. But now being an adult and realizing that I've got to accept those same truths about myself.

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Our species is animalistic regardless of being human. It doesn't make us superior.

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It just makes us a species. And there's so much to the species that I don't think people are willing to acknowledge or accept or talk about because it's always easier to sweep it under the rug. And I'm not that  person. I've never been taught to be that person. I've always been forced and pushed into self help and motivation.

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I'm like, literally the most naturally coked out person you'll ever meet. High energy, no matter how monotone I am, when I speak, when you meet me, I'm a lot. And I love every part of that. And I come from that. My birth mother was a lot.

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She demanded a lot of attention, and so do I. And I want to make sure other people have that same attention. And I think that's what's really cool about my journey and where I've ended up being able to experience the hurts and the pains and all the ugly that none of us want to talk about. I'm willing to. And so I want to keep my chapter short because let's admit that we have the worst attention span, including myself.

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I'm very ADHD.

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But once upon a time, there was this person that was so happy, so free, and ended up hating themselves because family tore them apart, tortured them, made them feel like who they were was ugly, unaccepted.

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I was so kind of fucked up because in religion you're taught that love is between a man and a woman. But I was getting fucked by my uncle and my great uncle and some friends of theirs. It was a good ass time! Fucking around with my cousins because we were all being tortured and raped and nobody wanted to talk about it but me. And that stems from my birth mother. She's so honest.

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I never knew that my strength stems from that moment. So, yeah, my first love is my mother, and I'm proud to be her child.

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I'm proud to know where I come from and I'm proud to have gone through the things I've gone through, because I also know that I'm strong and willing to speak up for people that can't speak up for themselves.

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Every person I've met along my journey has led me in a way that I've needed and also not needed. I call myself a walking contradiction most of the time because I want both of best worlds. I feel like I know who I am, but at the same time, I don't. And I also feel like while I'm figuring it out, I'm not. And so I feel like that's so relatable because we all feel that way, but who's going to be honest?

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You don't even have to share it, but just even hearing it and knowing that you can experience the same thing just in your own right, your own way, and choosing to love someone for who they are apart from yourself. It's all I've ever wanted.

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I never had it, but I have it now, and that's the most important thing.

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And again, I'm probably going to quote, like, RuPaul way too much, but I do love RuPaul. And I'm sorry I wasn't introduced sooner because there are people that I value as icons, as individuals of having a platform and a voice that have changed and shaped me and have allowed me to have space, to be honest, and never having a dance move in my life other than what I created by myself in my own room. My mother had this stereo system that was so big and out of control and I loved every moment, lived for it, slayed it. And I'm a good dancer because of it, and I know that. But it also just, like, helped me disappear for a moment.

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It's unfortunate that, like, drugs and alcohol are introduced to you as an adult because that shit will fuck you up. I should just be dancing and I'm going to keep dancing and I hope you do too. And wherever you come from doesn't matter. It's a starting point that you have no control over. We don't control the family we're born into.

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Also, generational trauma is very much the definition of insanity. Doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result. You have to do different if you want different, like, you have to be the change. And my grandmother said to me my whole life, you're going to break the cycle. And I know I did.

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And I'm so happy to share this moment and this journey with you because where you start is so important, but it does not dictate where you end up. So be true to be you. Love yourself, love others, and keep fighting for love. Until next time. I'm Dale Edward Sullivan-Driver-Kiefer-Perrault. Welcome to "My Fucked Up Fairytale: A Trauma Queen Confessional". This episode is titled "Once Upon a Time". Bye, babies!