BETSY KALIN:

Okay. As always, I will be in the background in case you guys need me. Right. Thank you. And when you want to take your break, just let me know. Okay. Terrific. And then just so you know, Stephanie, my voice isn't going to be on the recordings. So if I ask you a question, can you try and rephrase the question in your answer? If I said, You know, what did you have for breakfast today? You know, you don't--

STEPHANIE STUART:

I would say for breakfast this morning, I had

BETSY KALIN:

You're perfect, I mean, I knew you were a pro

STEPHANIE STUART:

That's what I should have back there is all the Q&A awards I've won and the interview awards

BETSY KALIN:

Oh no, go ahead.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I'm just bragging about myself. Go on.

BETSY KALIN:

That's what this is about. And if there's ever, you know, something that I ask you about that you don't feel comfortable talking about, just feel free to tell me, you know,

STEPHANIE STUART:

I want this to be a wide open book. The pre-interview took me to some places I hadn't seen in many years. And I don't mind that now. I don't mind that if it's going to help somebody on this same journey, then that's what it's for. And you know, I've been telling people I wanted to document something. I wanted to leave something behind. And when OUTWORDS approached me, I thought, well, there it is. I'll leave that behind for the world to look at and maybe generations down the road will still use it.

BETSY KALIN:

Great. Great. Well then, okay. Let's get started. So the first question is please give your name and your date and place of birth on camera.

STEPHANIE STUART:

My full legal name is Stephanie Ann Stuart Wilson, and I was born in a strawberry patch in Plant City, Florida.

BETSY KALIN:

And what was the year and date?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh, goodness. December. Oh, the date was December 30th, 1965. I am 55 years old.

BETSY KALIN:

Great, thank you. Thanks for that. And so you said you were born there, but did you grow up there? Where did you grow up?

STEPHANIE STUART:

I was born in Plant City. Then we lived in Lakeland until I was in the fourth grade. About halfway through fourth grade, we moved to an even smaller town called Bartow, which is the County seat of Polk County.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And that's where I was raised, graduated high school, did a little bit of college from there. But then in my adult life moved back to Lakeland, stayed there until I was 45 and then moved on to Clearwater. And now I'm in New Port Richey.

BETSY KALIN:

Great. Thank you. And when were you first aware of being part of the LGBTQ community and did you know anybody who was LGBTQ?

STEPHANIE STUART:

You know, I've known since I can remember, I've known I was different. I've known something wasn't quite right. I did not know any gay people in the beginning, but after I got into adulthood, I realized that my mother was hanging out with a lesbian couple and there was nothing wrong with that. They were accepting in the family, but yes, I've known from the beginning,

STEPHANIE STUART:

and there was an afternoon where my brother and I were at my grandma's house and we got to play at her toy box. Well, she had dresses and aprons as well as toys in this toy box, but Kevin and I went right straight for those dresses and those aprons, we put them on, we played, grandma got some pictures, it was fun. My mother was pissed. My mother was so mad about that. But yeah, as long as I can remember, I've always been different

STEPHANIE STUART:

than everybody else, something wasn't quite right. And it wasn't until I grew up and got educated that I realized, you know, the terminology and where I am and what I needed to do to make me who I'm supposed to be.

BETSY KALIN:

So I know that in your pre-interview you talked a little bit about your relationship with your family and your parents growing up. Can you talk about that?

STEPHANIE STUART:

I have to say growing up, I felt like

STEPHANIE STUART:

the proverbial red-headed stepchild for lack of a better metaphor. There was my mom, my dad, and my brother over here. And then there was me here. I never really felt like I connected with them. And I always felt like if I expressed who I was, things were going to crumble and fall apart. And that's exactly what happened. They found out around my 18th birthday that I--at that point I was a boy, I was gay--and

BETSY KALIN:

Yeah,

STEPHANIE STUART:

Daddy told me nobody would live, nobody in his family was going to live like that, sat me down in his office at work and told me to move out of the County, move out of the house. You're no longer a member of this family. Don't call us, we don't want to talk to you. Nobody in the family wants to talk to you, nobody. And yeah, that was rough. That was, and that was 38 years ago, Easter weekend this year. And for the first time

STEPHANIE STUART:

I said it out loud during the pre-interview, and it hurt, but it was healing. It was healing, but yeah, he--and I used his words kind of against him. He told me to do all that, so I did. I changed my name to Stephanie. I eventually--it took 20 years--but I eventually moved to Pasco County and now I have my own house, but I also have my own kids, my own family and my own circle. And I'm okay with that.

BETSY KALIN:

Thank you. Thank you for sharing, because it is really important because so many of us face that, you know, in our lives and I think it could really help to see how, just how resilient and how strong and how far you've come, through that.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I didn't know how strong I was until things began to evolve later. You know, when I was diagnosed with HIV, that was June 24th, 1993.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And they gave me a death sentence. They gave me a two year timeline, told me that at the end of that two years to have my affairs together. In other words, it was going to be over. And I just, I refused to believe that. I went home, I had a hissy fit. I threw myself out on the living room floor, cried, screamed, hollered, did all that, but then pulled myself together and was like, okay, now what do I do now?

STEPHANIE STUART:

I've got this, but I'm not going to be one of those that's going to die from it. My friends would get diagnosed and then they'd just start living hard. They'd start doing every drug they could get ahold of. They were drinking every single night. It was over, they didn't care. And I, I didn't fall into that trap. I educated myself and did what I needed to do.

BETSY KALIN:

There were a couple of questions I wanted to ask you. Just about your background before we move on to after you moved out of the house. And when was, you know, about the town that you grew up in? I think you had said that it was very conservative. It was in central Florida. Can you talk about that?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Bartow is the County seat for Polk County, Florida. And yes, very, very conservative, very conservative. Now I did grow up in the Baptist church. We were very active in the first Baptist church. I played the piano for several of the choirs and I sang in the youth choir and participated in retreats and stuff. But my senior year--every year the church gave out an award to the top boy and the top girl senior,

STEPHANIE STUART:

I don't remember the rest of the specifics, but something like that--anyway, my senior year I was to receive this award, but the gossip mill started in Bartow that I was gay and they didn't give me that award. They didn't do it. They didn't do it. I didn't care anyway. My mother was very upset about it, but yes, Bartow was very conservative and coming home from school when I was in high school, there was a guy that tormented the daylights out of me.

STEPHANIE STUART:

He would, he had a car, I was on a bike and he would get behind me with his car and tailgate me, so to speak, on my bike. He'd blow the horn, they'd call names. I tried three or four different routes home to stay away from him, and it seemed like he was always one step ahead of me. But I had some good relationships with kids in school, but after I got out of school and began to realize who I was,

STEPHANIE STUART:

that all began to change and all of a sudden they didn't want anything to do with me. And now through Facebook, there's a handful that I speak to, but, you know, they're LGBTQ reaching out to me. So it made it more comfortable.

BETSY KALIN:

Wow. And so tell me again, you always felt female from the time that you were little, and even after that experience at your grandma's, like tell me about that.

STEPHANIE STUART:

There were other experiences. It wasn't just that one at grandma's. If I heard it once, I heard it a thousand times: "the next time I catch you in my closet, wearing my shoes, I'm going to send you to school with them." Well, she never did. That's why I kept doing it, I was hoping she would. But yeah, I played in mama's closet. And honey, the very first drag pageant idea, there was a sportswear category.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I went into mother's closet, and got the finest thing I could find. And off I went to Orlando to enter that drag pageant, I'll never forget that. And put it back the next day. I don't think she was ever aware of it, I really don't. So, yeah.

BETSY KALIN:

And so, you said that the summer that you turned 18, you just really started cross-dressing and you never looked back.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I really didn't. I turned 18 in December of 1983

STEPHANIE STUART:

and in March/April of 83, that was when daddy threw me out of the house. And I struggled with somewhere to live, got through the summer. And then got comfortable, got back on my feet. And in September realized that, you know, I was struggling, I was really struggling. So I decided to do an experiment. I got dressed as Stephanie and I went to the flea market

STEPHANIE STUART:

and it was a positive experience all the way around. Everybody was sweet. They couldn't help me enough. They couldn't help me enough, they couldn't give me enough. It was just, it was really nice. And I thought, you know, this is comfortable. And then the next week I went as my dead person, I guess we could say. And I was ignored. I was looked at, downplayed, you know, so to speak. So I thought, okay, well I've always felt this way. Let's see what happens.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And so I started this in fall in September of my 18th year. I started dressing as Stephanie, started going by the name Stephanie, and I even began to apply for jobs as Stephanie, but using the old name. And I got, I got work. I really got work. I talked my way through some things. And, and yeah. And I think at one job, my mother even called and asked--my boy name was an L word. S

STEPHANIE STUART:

o we'll call it that, the L word--and my mother called and she used the L word and I could see the other operators face kind of twist. And, and then she's like: "Oh, wait a minute, you want Stephanie don't you?" And, and the phone was silent, but I knew who it was. And yeah, that was an interesting moment there.

BETSY KALIN:

And when did you change your name and start on hormones? When did that journey begin?

STEPHANIE STUART:

I started the first journey at 18 and it would be another 10 years before the rest of it came along. I tried desperately to speak to the girls I worked with, doing shows who were on hormones, and it seemed like this huge giant secret of who the hormone doctor was to this day. I still don't understand that I don't, but eventually, I got it, and I got a hold of him. And it all happened at once. I filed the papers with the court to have my name legally changed,

STEPHANIE STUART:

and then saw Dr. Minton to start the hormones for the transition, because I had planned to go all the way, I was going through all of the surgery, sexual reassignment and everything. And part of the workup, part of the physical for the hormones was an HIV test. And I had been tested every six months faithfully, previously, two years, and that one came back positive. And although it didn't put a stop on things,

STEPHANIE STUART:

it kind of slowed them down for a little bit. But I started the hormones then got my name changed. And let me share this funny with you. I went to court that morning and got my name changed. And I walked out of that courtroom with a piece of paper that said I am now Stephanie Ann Stuart Wilson. Honey, you would have thought I owned the world. I went to work and this hateful woman I had worked for for five years got on my last nerve.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I said to her, if you feel that way, write my last paycheck and leave it on the computer. She did. So I left, but I really was stepping out into a new life. I went that afternoon to the social security office, had that paperwork done, went to the driver's license office, got that paperwork done, went to the bank. I spent the whole afternoon changing everything. And oh my goodness. Looking back, it was the first step of the rest of my life.

STEPHANIE STUART:

It really was. It was very much a life changing moment. Ooh. I knew we were gonna do this, but it's okay.

BETSY KALIN:

That's beautiful. It's an amazing story. I wish I was there to celebrate with you. Go out to dinner.

STEPHANIE STUART:

That's what I'm doing tonight. I'll be celebrating tonight.

BETSY KALIN:

And then, so, what was your coming out story as far as being trans? Did you have one or were you just suddenly Stephanie?

STEPHANIE STUART:

You know, I guess I really was just suddenly Stephanie, I really don't have a coming out moment. There was no big party. There was no celebration at the bar. It was just, okay, world, pow! Here I am. This is who I am. And my phrase all my life has been, you know, if I have to deal with it, so do you. If I have to live my life as a transgender woman,

STEPHANIE STUART:

you have to put up with me living my life as a transgender woman. Cause there's nothing anybody can do about it. That is the way it is.

BETSY KALIN:

Fantastic. And then you mentioned this a little bit, but how did you first get involved with the drag scene?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh, the drag. When I got thrown out, I met up with some other gay people that were in the same situation. Their parents had turned on them too. So we all got together and we got a little apartment. It was not the best situation,

STEPHANIE STUART:

but it got us through that time. And I met two drag Queens that had just moved here from West Virginia and they started talking about doing drag. Well, honey, my eyes lit up. We went to the local Goodwill, we bought dresses. I would just lounge around the house in a dress. I'd come home from work, put a dress on and spend the evening just laying in a dress, like some kind of goddess or something. But we got to talking about shows and stuff and I wanted to know what to do and how we could do this.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And so we put together, Oh my God, this is April. Oh my Lord. So 38 years ago, we rented the Winter Haven woman's club. We had a party, we had a wet bar, and we had a drag show. And my first drag number was "let's hear it for the boy". And I still do it to this day. Don't judge me. But yeah, that was my first drag experience.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And it really, it really started something that now is my life. I've done it off and on, but in the last two years, I have really wrapped my world around the drag scene, because it's an outlet for me to get my message out to people and let them know that, you know, I've been through all this. And I hope that what I've done makes your journey a little bit easier.

BETSY KALIN:

That's great. So now I'm going to talk about, I think at some point, you said

BETSY KALIN:

when you first started out you didn't get any awards, but then you talk about how you were one Miss Lady Lakeland. Okay.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh goodness. My titles, Oh my titles. I've always been a pageant queen. Growing up, I would watch Miss America and Miss Universe on TV and I'd get me a little toy crown. And when they'd call the winter, I'd pretend it was me. I'd put that crown on my head and,

STEPHANIE STUART:

and yeah, so I've, I've always loved pageantry and stuff like that. But my first pageant, my first drag pageant was Ms. Gay Orlando in 1984. That was the one where I borrowed mother's clothes. And yes, I was a hot mess. There were 18 contestants. I placed 19th. They put me behind Geraldine Jones and she rolled up and down the curtain. But it, it was a mess, but I kept at it. And in February of the next year, I won Ms. Gay Lakeland, 1985. It was my first title.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I thought, boy, I was set, this is it. I'm going to do it. I didn't realize the work that went behind pageants at that point. I was just after the crown. So I, I met a guy and decided to live the quote on quote straight life for a little while. I got a job and stepped away from drag for a little bit. But when that ended, I went back and decided to compete some more. Placed in a few pageants, qualified for Miss Florida.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And then a few years after that stepped back out, I met my wife, Alison, and she was amazing. She was amazing. And I say "was" because the last three years of her life, I had to step away and donate--not donate--give to her. I had to take care of her. She was my wife and she had a brain cancer and I had to do what I had to do. After she passed on,

STEPHANIE STUART:

I knew I needed to do something to take care of myself. So here I went back to drag. She passed away on February 18th. On March 13th, I entered the Miss Sawmill pageant. Out of nine contestants, I was second runner-up. I thought, wow. After three years absent, that's not bad. Then I went to Ms. Southeast continental elite, the following year in March, and I won that. And then I got to go to Chicago and compete at continental elite. I was 11th overall,

STEPHANIE STUART:

one bitter point away from winning the interview category. And then the ball just started rolling. I won the St. Pete Pride in 2014. Miss Ocala Pride 2015, Ms. ASAP 2016, Ms. Epic 2017, Ms. Quench 2017, Ms. Nature Coast 2017. I was the first Miss Pasco Pride in 2018. And now, I represent the Royal Court of Come Out St. Pete in the trans and the drag division.

STEPHANIE STUART:

A lot of my titles have been service titles, 'cause I do believe in giving back. Ms. Quench was huge, big crown. But yeah, that's my pageant experiences. I don't know that it's over, my God I'm 55, but they've got elite and classic pageants all over the place. And who knows where I'm headed next? Who knows, but I'm going to get there.

BETSY KALIN:

He talked a little bit about how, you know, this was something to help you heal after Allie died and you know, what else, can you talk about what it's really given you like doing the pageants?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Something, something in the pageants that really helped me get through the grief process and the loss of my wife, because I was 35 when I met her and she was the love of my life. And I only had her for seven years and then she was gone.

STEPHANIE STUART:

So I'm a big golden girls fan, aren't we all? And I began, and I love Rue McClanahan and Blanche Devereaux. I am Blanche Devereaux. All of a sudden I really was Blanche Devereaux, much too beautiful and too young to be a widow. And I turned to the young boys to help me get through it. It was fabulous, but I also went to my computer and was like, okay, I need to make this into something. So I put together my Blanche Devereaux talent. She is now 10 years old.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And that is the number that has helped me win all the pageants that I've had, and given me all the opportunities, and I get bookings where they say "Is Blanche coming?" Well, honey, you bet she is. She'll be there. She'll be there. And that's, that's been a big help because it's comedy. It's fun. And it's just really healing. It's been an amazing experience with Blanche.

BETSY KALIN:

Thank you. Thank you for sharing that.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Girl, you got me all emotional today. Oh goodness.

BETSY KALIN:

Do you need to take a break?

STEPHANIE STUART:

No, let's roll on with it because this is when the real stuff is coming out.

BETSY KALIN:

Okay. So, I want to talk a little bit more about your HIV story and, you know, being, when you were diagnosed, you said that you told me a little bit about that, but then,

BETSY KALIN:

Oh, I'm sorry. Did I break up?

STEPHANIE STUART:

You kind of staggered on me. Okay. You're back.

BETSY KALIN:

Okay. okay. I wanted to know what happened after you received your diagnosis. Right?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Right. Let me start this by saying something that most people don't know about me is I am not on female hormones, and I haven't been for about 20 years,

STEPHANIE STUART:

maybe 25 years. When I was diagnosed with HIV, at first, I didn't start any kind of medication. Thank God I didn't, because that was when AZT was out. But I was monitored closely. And then when the time came, and the numbers got out of hand, that's when I started the medication, but it gave me pancreatitis. I spent one summer staying away from any food that was white. Do you know how difficult that is?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Lost a lot of weight, but Carol Dre, God rest her soul, got me through it and got me through that summer. And then my liver started giving me a problem. And that's when they said to me, you have a choice. You can either take the female hormones or you can take the HIV medicine. And of course, you know the doctors, they wanted me to stick with the HIV medicine, and I did. I was choosing life at that point. And I don't regret that decision.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I've had, I've had some black market silicone work done. Some of it I'm not real proud of. That's why I have these bumps here. But that was my decision, and I made it, so I'm living with that. But I feel very blessed. I really do because I haven't had a hormone shot in 20 years. And, if I dare say, look at me, praise God, praise God in my hair, my hair, I had cancer last summer.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I went through six weeks of radiation, 30 radiation treatments, four rounds of chemo. And they told me my hair was gonna fall out. I got lied to again. See, they told me I was gonna die when I had HIV. And I, I mean, when they diagnosed me with that, I didn't, and they told me my hair was gonna fall out. And it didn't. But yes, I'm happy that's over. I just had my fourth clear pet scan.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Got the results a week ago. I'm still cancer-free. And I don't have to go back now til October. So I'm very grateful for that too.

BETSY KALIN:

Congratulations. That's amazing news.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I wanted to write that chapter in my story myself. Yes, I had cancer, but I didn't want anybody to see me as the toilet hugging, throwing up, cancer patient. And thank God it never got that way. They have great drugs now.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And the chemo is adjusted and honed and better now. And I just, I wasn't going to have it. I wanted to take charge of that. So my last treatment was on August 12th, and I saw online that they were doing an online pageant for come out St. Pete. And I thought, you know, this is online. I don't have to go anywhere and I can manage this. So I called my son, RJ. He brought his girlfriend Mariah, and we took his iPhone and out we went to the beach.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I filmed, we filmed the presentation video out there. And then we came back to the apartment, moved everything out of the living room and did the talent video here, which was Blanche Devereaux. And I sent that off to them, and Ooh. Labor day weekend, as I was getting ready to go to the camp ground. I am so sorry. That's when they called me and notified me that not only had I won one category,

STEPHANIE STUART:

I had won both: the trends and the drag division. And I thought, that's exactly how I wanted it to go. Two weeks after treatment, I won a title. That's Stephanie Stuart right there. Oh, I'm so sorry.

BETSY KALIN:

No, don't apologize. This is emotional. This is emotional stuff. You know, just let me know if you ever need a moment or you just want to get some water or

STEPHANIE STUART:

The one thing I didn't do was put tissues in arm's reach. Jeff's idea. Here we go. Yes, I did. Cause I expected, I expected this. Should've put on more makeup.

BETSY KALIN:

So you know, one of the things that, when you were diagnosed, you're a long-term survivor of HIV was the stigma. And how, how did you deal with the stigma in those early days?

STEPHANIE STUART:

In the early days of HIV, there was such a strong stigma that I kinda just gave into the peer pressure and handled it their way so to speak. I tried, well, I tried to, I tried to, I wasn't going to tell anybody, I was just going to handle it on my own. And then it got to be too much of a burden. And I began to share with my friends what had happened. And there were some that were just fine and stuck with me. And then there were others that didn't want anything to do with me.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And the biggest question everybody was asking was, who'd you get it from? Do you know where you got it? It was like, honey, what difference does it make now? I don't care where I got it from. I have it. And after talking with the doctor, I think it was about six months in. We were talking and they ran some tests and I could narrow it down to the two infections I got. But again, that didn't matter. I had it. And that's what mattered.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I tried hard to focus on the positive and stay away from the HIV. Yes, I have it, but I'm going to live my best life. I exercised. I began to eat differently, follow more fruits and vegetables, and get myself healthy. I was probably about 10 years in when the numbers started going bad and I had to start taking medicine. And that, that was a rough time. I've been on so many different regimes,

STEPHANIE STUART:

but thank God I started with 13 pills and now I have two, that's all I take, two in the morning. And things are good. My, my immune system got beat up by the chemo. It almost feels like I had to trade half of my immune system to get rid of the cancer because the numbers are low and I'm considered compromised, but my viral load is still undetectable. And that is what is most important.

BETSY KALIN:

Is there anything that you want people to know about being HIV positive and having cancer? Like are there certain things that people should know about? Are there certain treatment plans? Like I know this was something you mentioned in your questionnaire.

STEPHANIE STUART:

If I was to offer some advice about HIV or cancer or both, I would say, you know, first of all, HIV is no longer the death sentence It was.

STEPHANIE STUART:

The medicines are a lot more tolerable, a lot easier to take. And ironically, it's the same thing with cancer, because they, they gave me all these side effects that was going to happen with the chemo. But the chemos nowadays are so much easier on your system. I barely, all I had was a severe outbreak of shingles. And for me, with with both, it was following the doctor, listening to what's going on and taking care of yourself,

STEPHANIE STUART:

making sure you eat right. Don't go overboard with the drinking and recreational things and stuff like that. But yeah, stay true to yourself and all of that, keep yourself healthy, protect yourself and your others. And like they say, know your status, because if you're HIV positive and you don't know it, you could be out there having unprotected sex and spreading it across the land. But if you're HIV positive and you know it, then you're on medication,

STEPHANIE STUART:

then your viral load is undetectable and you equals you. If you're undetectable, you're untransmittable. So educate yourself on that too, and yeah. And get tested for cancer too.

BETSY KALIN:

Yes. All great advice. So, how did you become an activist for HIV and for speaking up about different things, like all of the work that you do?

STEPHANIE STUART:

When, when I first started in the scene with the gay bars and the drag in 1984, HIV was prominent. It had just come out and there were lots of benefits shows everywhere. So you, you did it of course to help the community, but it was also a great platform to launch your career and show off your talent. And so that's, that's how I got started with both. I began to do that,

STEPHANIE STUART:

helping people, but also getting my career going from there. And it just snowballed. I helped to, you know, someone would die and we'd throw a benefit for them. The local organization, the local aid service organization would need help with something. We'd throw a benefit for them. And then the governor would do something. Something we don't like, we'd write him a letter, we'd go protest. And it just evolved. It wasn't, it wasn't like one day I said, okay, I'm an activist today.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Now it just evolved to where I've, I've, I've marched. I've protested, I've raised money. I've been to Washington DC to protest HIV research cuts. I was due to go back last year, but the pandemic hit. And I, I'm ready to do what I can. I want to be a voice for people. And I truly want to be a voice for children. I want children to know that there is somebody in your corner and, most especially these days, our trans children.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Our trans kids are under such attack. There are five States that have passed just the most awful laws against transgender girls and sports. And they're only going after the transgender girls. They're not even making it blanket for all of us trans people, they're going after the girls. And it just, it's awful, but I want those trans kids to know, hang in there, somebody's fighting for you. We're here. We're here.

BETSY KALIN:

Thank you. I'm so glad. And I'm so glad that we have you fighting, fighting for us. Something else that I wanted to talk about is, you know, what was it like, you know, in the early days of the AIDS epidemic and what was it like in the South and in Florida?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh, goodness. Oh goodness. Let's talk about the early days of HIV. How about it's 1982 and we've got the Reyes brothers

STEPHANIE STUART:

who all were haemophiliacs and those people in Arcadia burnt those children's house down. Burned it to the ground. Didn't want them in the school, and, and bless their hearts eventually they all did go on and pass and it stayed that way for a long time. We had the first world AIDS day service in Polk, in Lakeland. And forgive me, I don't know the exact date, but it was around that time. And we, we gathered around Lake Morton with our candles.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And next thing you know, across the street from us, there stands the KKK. And it's like, really? Why are you even here? The answer was, we're here for the innocent victims of HIV. Well, honey, we're all innocent victims of HIV. Nobody asked for it. Nobody asked for it at all, but it just, there was such a stigma about it. People were so nasty to us about it.

STEPHANIE STUART:

You know, they didn't accept it. The communities were really bad about it. But finally Polk opened an AIDS service organization. This little group, bless their hearts. They opened it up in this little tiny house on main street. House wasn't even as big as my little apartment. But they helped so many people through that little organization and got us to where now you go to the health department and you see, you see real doctors, regular doctors. You don't have to go to these special clinics anymore. And yeah, it was,

STEPHANIE STUART:

but it was rough. It was rough. Those times we had the president who wasn't even going to say anything about it. Didn't mention it. Didn't talk about it. Offered no funding, no research. And I did a pageant one time and they asked me if I had one question to ask the president, what would it be? And George Bush was president at the time, he had just gotten elected. And my question was why. I wanted to know why. and I let him have it. Why didn't you say it? Why didn't you talk about it?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Why didn't you bring us research money so we could find out more about it. Why did so many have to die? And girl now with COVID you could ask those same questions. Good. And you, Hmm. Yeah. But it was, it was tough back then. And even still, even still, there is such a strong stigma with HIV and being dirty or, or a sex worker. Not that there's anything wrong with that. And you know, or you're shooting up or any of these, and they want it to be a CD scenario of how you got into dirt,

STEPHANIE STUART:

dark, dirty, secret, but it's not. And I've tried my best, not to be a secret. I've let anybody and everybody know that I'm HIV positive and I'm proud of it. I'm healthy. I've got, I got 27 years under my belt HIV positive, and girl, and get this. Here's the statistic for you. Technically, I have AIDS and I had cancer.

STEPHANIE STUART:

My mother, my father, my brother, and myself, I'm the healthiest one. Me. Yeah.

BETSY KALIN:

But one could say it is that you love life and you are who you are. So you're true to yourself. And I can't see how that could not benefit your health in all sorts of ways.

STEPHANIE STUART:

There's other things I have to do. I have my, I have my exercise bike, and I have a little bench for me to do some sit-ups on.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And, and yeah, like I do, I, I eat healthy. I try not to splurge too much on bad food.

BETSY KALIN:

So, I mean, you survived. You're a long-term survivor. Did you have any guilt about that? About being one of the few who made it through?

STEPHANIE STUART:

I did, I did. And you know, it's ironic that that comes up. There was some guilt as a survivor of HIV.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And then I see on the TV last night that they've got this new little teeny chip thing that they can put in your bloodstream and they could send it to the brain tumor that's at the base of your head. And that was where my wife's tumor was that could not be treated. Now they can treat it. And I lost my train of thought completely, but what they're doing with treatments nowadays, medically, are incredible. Where were we going with that? I'm so sorry.

BETSY KALIN:

I think you were talking about survivor's guilt.

STEPHANIE STUART

The survivor guilt. The survivor guilt. Cause yeah a lot of friends passed away and a lot of it was because of the AZT. After we got past that AZT time and got to some really nice cocktails that worked, then people started living longer. I'm on a housing program, which is why I'm kind of glad we're here in my kitchen. I'm on a housing program. HOPWA funding, Housing Opportunities for Persons with AIDS. And I've lost my train of thought again. Survivor's guilt.

BETSY KALIN:

And it must be a hard topic. It's okay.

STEPHANIE STUART

I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry.

BETSY KALIN:

No, no I'm sorry. I didn't. I just, I have read somewhere where you talked a little bit about that and I just wanted to see if you, but you don't have to, we can move on.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Let me say that a lot of the survivor's guilt I deal with now is because of my cancer. I came out of the cancer center that day, all excited saying I beat it. And then I thought, gosh, I wish you were here to celebrate with me, but would you really celebrate with me because it killed you? And I thought, wow, that really is, it's weird. It's really weird videos. But I have, I have an event tonight for the dining out for life, the double show, and

STEPHANIE STUART:

I'm going to be wearing my cancer sash. It's a cancer survivor sash that I had ordered. And the reason I'm wearing it is because I had anal cancer. And I got anal cancer because I am a long-term survivor of HIV. That's exactly what the doctor told me. It's a side effect. So, but hey, when they brought me to the stage the other night, she said "and they even tried to kill her with cancer". So, yeah, I hope some of that's useful.

BETSY KALIN:

Yes. And so, I want to find out now more about, you know, how you started in the Basic Needs of Life program, and you know, the service organization and giving back to the community.

STEPHANIE STUART:

This little crown right here. This little crown here. See that one. I did the Miss Hernando FI pageant. I had aspirations to be Miss Florida. Well, there were several contestants in that pageant

STEPHANIE STUART:

and I ended up second runner up and didn't qualify for Miss Florida. But they gave away an award called the ambassador of hope, and it was based on your community service. So I filled out the application, turned it in, and it turns out I won the award. And they gave me that lovely little crown there. And on the way home, I thought, you know, I got this because of what I've done. So that means it's time to do something more.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I started by going to the Dollar General and buying those little dollar bottles of Dawn dish washing detergent and took that to the food bank. But then realized there was a real need for basic needs, toilet paper, toothbrushes deodorant, mouthwashes, those kinds of things that food stamps don't buy. And that's how we started the Basic Needs of Life was by providing things that food stamps wouldn't buy. After a period of time, that food pantry closed and that organization

STEPHANIE STUART:

that we were affiliated with, they went away, but we didn't. So we changed things up and decided to focus on children at Christmas. And what we do, and it's still going on to this day. I'm not the director of it anymore. When I moved down to Lakeland I handed it off. But what we do is we open our doors on November 1st. We put donation boxes out through the community seeking donations of toys. And then the Saturday before Christmas, depending on the calendar, we do a benefit show

STEPHANIE STUART:

and raise money and collect more toys. After the show, we all gathered at the house, we inventoried everything we had. And then we got a list from the health department and we would match those toys up with kids. And because these were children that were living with or affected with HIV and AIDS, we never got to see them. We never got to hand the toys to them. We had to take them to the caseworkers and then they would pass them on from there. But the Basic Needs of Life program has been going on for about 15 years now.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I'm really proud of where it is. We do it every year. And in the last five years, it's really expanded to include food for families. So Katherine Nevis, Stephen Lewis, my drag daughter, is doing an amazing job with the Basic Needs of Life. And I'm very proud of that.

BETSY KALIN:

Oh, that's wonderful. That's a great story. So we're, we're moving into a little bit more about, you know, Pride and attending Pride events,

BETSY KALIN:

and then we'll go even further into the Drag Queen Story Hour, but I wanted to get you started with Pride.

STEPHANIE STUART:

We haven't even gotten to story hour yet have we. Oh my goodness. Let's see. Pride. One of the titles that I have is Miss Polk Pride. I was the first Miss Polk Pride. They had a celebration. We did it at Cypress gardens. It was, it was nice. It was cute, but it was nice,

STEPHANIE STUART:

but it wasn't the celebrations that were to come. And when Alison was alive and I was caretaking for her, I would see the Pride celebrations on the news for Tampa Pride, the St. Pete Pride, and Orlando Pride. And I think, you know, I need to be there. I need to be a part of that, but my obligations were at home. I couldn't do it. Well after she passed away, and I moved over to the West Coast, the opportunity presented itself. So I entered Miss St. Pete Pride 2014. I did it because I wanted to secure my spot on the stage and perform at St. Pete Pride.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I mean, my God, what an honor. But I did more than secure my spot, honey. I won that pageant. And it just, it started the ball rolling for the service titles and the work. And I was from there, I was the first Miss Ocala Pride. When I went to Ocala, I had family up there that met me at the Pride festival. And that was when I thought I was Dolly Parton. So I did Dolly Parton for the Ocala Pride festival.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I'm up there just having the time of my life. But then I went into Rocky Top and I looked down and there sits my Aunt Nancy in the audience. Well, I spent a summer with her on the side of a Rocky Top Mountain in Tennessee. And it was, it was just such a moment between us to have that, but, but that they treated us like Kings and Queens at that festival. It was really nice. It was. And then I came home and ASAP opened up. Miss ASAP was coming up and I had entered this pageant when Alison was alive.

STEPHANIE STUART:

She came with me and her and I entered it. And the only category I won was Q&A I didn't place or nothing. So I entered the second time. And again, the only category I won was Q&A, but this time it was all I needed. I won the pageant and that opened the door to do more benefits and more work for the community and for HIV. And, on from there, I just, I probably sound like a broken record, but that is my passion

STEPHANIE STUART:

is helping the community and helping people, and especially my kids, my kids. I don't ever want a child to feel the way I felt growing up. I want children to grow up confident and knowing that what, knowing that they can do anything because I do Drag Queen Story Hour. This was a dream of mine. Tiffany Roseano gave me the opportunity to do a story hour with her.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And when I did that, when I knew then, this was something I really, really wanted to do regularly. So after I was crowned Miss Pasco Pride, I was at a board meeting and they asked me, is there anything you want to do? Do you have any ideas of anything? So I told them, and within a month we were off and running, we were off and running. And I tell my kids at story hour, that is still going on now three years later that if I can sit before you as a 55 year old transgender drag queen woman, they probably don't even understand what that is.

STEPHANIE STUART:

But if I can sit before you and do this, there's nothing you can't do. You can be anything you want to be. You can do anything you want to do. You just have to apply the work. The other thing I tell them is the only thing in life you ever have to be is yourself. It's up to you to find what that is, but that's all you ever have to be. And I really, really, I'm a firm believer in supporting children. I am, we have, we have protesters that come to story hour a lot.

STEPHANIE STUART:

But in the early days, it was really sad because these protesters were bringing their children. And their children would be standing on the sidewalk with them. Their parents are being hateful and ugly and yelling awful things, but they're watching these kids go into this building and they want to know why they can't go with them. And I just, I just wanted to bring, y'all go ahead and protest, but bring the children in and let me read the story to them. But you knew that wasn't going to happen, but it just, that was heartbreaking, that was hard. But I'll always advocate for the underdog and for the child.

BETSY KALIN:

I think something else that you mentioned is when a mother brought her son to you. Can you tell me that story?

STEPHANIE STUART:

The beauty about the Pride festivals is that's where you can really reach children. You know, you're not going to find the children at your drag show at 11 o'clock Friday night, but at two o'clock on a Sunday afternoon in downtown St. Pete, you will. And I was, one year at Pride I was hosting,

STEPHANIE STUART:

and I was backstage while the queen was performing and this mother came up to me and she said to me, would you please tell my son who was about seven, that it's okay if he wears nail polish? So I did. I knelt down, I introduced myself and I said, see, I'm wearing nail polish. It's okay for you to wear nail polish. And it kind of, you know, how children are. I did my part. I thought that was that. So I went back to my show and about an hour or so later,

STEPHANIE STUART:

they were backstage again, they were behind the stage. So I went back there and I was talking to his mom a little bit. And then I realized, you know, let me try this again. So I knelt down and I got eye to eye with him. And I said, you know, it's okay to be different. I said, I'm going to tell you a secret. I'm a boy, just like you. And one day you can be a boy just like me.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh my God. His eyes got so wide. And he turned around and grabbed his mama's pant leg and started pulling, pulling, pulling. She's like, what, what? And he knelt down and whispered in her ear. And she said, yeah, honey, I told you that. That's what I was trying to tell you earlier. Those are the kids I need to reach because a child like that without love and support is going to end up lonely, depressed, and suicidal. And I don't want to see my kids go that way. I don't know. So I,

STEPHANIE STUART:

I should've had a Xanax. No, seriously, yes. I will always fight for my kids and do what's right for them.

BETSY KALIN:

That's a beautiful story, Stephanie. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that. So you talked a little bit about that there were some protestors and how you're at it.

BETSY KALIN:

You were at a new venue, can you talk a little bit about the new venue and then I wanted to find out more about what you've been doing during the pandemic with the Drag Queen Story Hour.

STEPHANIE STUART:

All right. Where are we starting again? Throw me a topic.

BETSY KALIN:

That when you have protesters, they can't get to the front door.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Protestors, yeah, protestors. When I start, when we started Drag Queen Story Hour, because it's a joint venture between myself and Pasco Pride, right from the very beginning that first one was at Christmas time. So I was in my little Mrs. Claus outfit and we only had three children and I don't even think they wrote enough to read, but what we did have was protestors. They showed up the very first day and they've been there every day. They still come to this day. And we've,

STEPHANIE STUART:

we've been through three different venues. The first one was a bookstore that was LGBTQ owned and friendly, but they were renting the building and the landlord of the building was taking issue with us there, so we had to move. And then from there, we went to city hall and applied, applied for peace hall, which is downtown in Newport Richie. We were going to do story hour there. Well, we did all the paperwork. Soon as the city found out, honey, they pulled the whistle on that quick

STEPHANIE STUART:

and gave us a real fit, even threatened to pull Pasco Pride from Newport Richie if we proceeded with story hour. And fortunately the library stepped up for us and we were able to move to the library. So that, that stopped that fight there. And then we had some issues with the library. We tried to do everything undercover and under assumed names and stuff, but we had a leak at the library.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Somebody was telling that church what we were doing. So the pandemic brought all that to an end. One thing that happened that was comical along that journey was they didn't want us doing Drag Queen Story Hour. So when it came time for Pasco Pride that year, we were going to do story hour under the gazebo, but the protesters were being so aggressive that I had to have a police escort into the building. And we moved Drag Queen Story Hour,

STEPHANIE STUART:

but I give you one guess where we ended up. Yes, ma'am. We ended up in peace hall that day, and we had Drag Queen Story Hour, the rest of the day, in peace hall. So see there, love does win. But when the, when the pandemic hit, it really brought everything of course, to a screeching halt, especially my story hour. And van suasion, RJ, who is my Mr. Pasco Pride and one of my sons, and now one of my very best friends.

STEPHANIE STUART:

He and I got together and we're like, what, what can we do? What can we do? So I pulled out my Winnie the Pooh book, and we decided to take story hour live on Facebook, and we did a bedtime story hour. And I, we, I would read, and he would sit behind me with his guitar and just play light music. And it, it was enjoyable. He transformed my living room into this poo bear paradise, brought out my pool collection, set everything up.

STEPHANIE STUART:

We did this, there were 18 chapters. We got through 16 of them. So that's how many we did. But every time, every week he would show up, redo the set, change everything up. And it was a great way to get to children again and do what we do. And we would get pictures from mothers of their children asleep on the floor, because they had put us on the TV and the child fell asleep on the floor. That, that was just so heartwarming to see that.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And then other pictures of them sitting there with their snacks, because yeah, we'd have this lavish set up, but there was always the snack plate on the front of the table with something on it. And that was enjoyable. I really miss that, but we're back, we're back. The pandemic has done whatever it's gonna do. Things have lightened, things have changed, and we are at a brand new venue called Zenfinitea. And for those of you in new port Richey, Florida, it's the old chill chamber,

STEPHANIE STUART:

which really blows my mind that I'm back there again. But they've, they've taken over this building. They've made this lovely tea house and they're going to do other things with the shopping center, but we're there for story hour the second Saturday of the month, and it's a secure venue. The protesters can't get to the front door, they can't get to us. In the past, they have been right at the front door and children and families would have to walk past them and listen to all their ugliness before they could get inside. They don't have to do that now. They can park in the parking lot.

STEPHANIE STUART:

We've got people holding flags up and they walk past the flags and go in the building. And they also have a nice patio at the tea house we can use too, and the protesters can't get back there. It's walled off and, and quiet back there too. So if I can say thank you to Chris and Sherry for giving us that venue and the other things you've done for me, y'all know what I'm talking about. I love you guys, but yeah, we're rolling along with story hour and we'll be back the second Saturday in may.

BETSY KALIN:

That's fantastic. I think one other thing that you didn't mention was how many viewers were watching you?

STEPHANIE STUART

Oh damn, I meant to do that.

BETSY KALIN:

That's okay I'm here to remind you, don't worry about it.

STEPHANIE STUART:

One of the things about story hour online that became very interesting was the numbers. I'm the child of a banker. So I'm all about the numbers. And pageants, I'd come home and analyze those score sheets like they were a spreadsheet for some kind of big corporate company.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I began to pay attention to the numbers on Facebook and they grew and they grew and they grew, and there was one particular story hour. My God, we had like 600, 800 viewers that night. And I'm thinking who are all these people tuning in to listen to this drag queen saying and read about Winnie the Pooh? Cause we, we even evolved to that. We began to sing the opening theme song, which was Winnie the Pooh. But being able to reach that many people with a book,

STEPHANIE STUART:

with a story, it shows that that need is still there. That could still happen. We, I'm active with bear soup here in Tampa. I do their bingo and I used to perform for them. But now I do bingo.

BETSY KALIN:

Can you explain who they are? Because people across the country might not know.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Bear Soup Tampa is another service organization, so to speak, they do community things for the LGBTQ community. There are a bunch of gay bears, big hairy men,

STEPHANIE STUART:

big bears, but you know, big bears are cuddly, soft, and sweet. And I had one of them message me after a story hour and tell me, this old bear is not too old to be read to. And I was like, Oh my goodness. And then he chimed in, he's checked in with every single one of the rest of the story hours. I saw him last night as a matter of fact. And yeah, story, see how it can reach anybody. It can reach anybody.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And it wasn't even an hour. It was about 45 minutes because I didn't, you know, children get bored. It was about 45 minutes, but it was time to get away. Time to forget about everything that was going on and just relax for a little bit. And I'd like to bring that back. We probably won't because things are changing, but I've got my story hour. So I'm really happy about that.

BETSY KALIN:

Yeah. I think that's a beautiful message. Let's see. I think the only other thing that you haven't really talked about was that there was this little boy Jeremiah and

STEPHANIE STUART:

Yeah. Jeremiah, let's see, this is, April that was. When we brought story hour back after the pandemic, the first one wasn't bad, we had about five or six kids. It went pretty well. Yeah, the protesters were there, but, but we still did what we did.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And we give out books all the time. We've given out almost 800 books now over the last three years. And we'll continue to do that. We get sponsors that donate it and give books to us and do that. But the second story hour, the one in February, was really difficult. Protestors were there early, and it seemed like there were more of them. They were bringing them in by the short bus full, cause that's what they drive is a short bus. But I was just getting so frustrated.

STEPHANIE STUART:

There were no kids, they were all protesters. And I'm thinking, why, what am I, am I really making a difference here? I was very frustrated that day. But finally a mother showed up and she had a little boy with him, little Jeremiah. And I talked to Mindy, our director. We decided to just go live with Facebook and do our readings online. That way we're not just reading to nobody, you know, maybe we could still reach some kids that way. Well, Jeremiah was just a joy. He sat there through the stories. We did everything.

STEPHANIE STUART:

When we got done, I gave a real heartfelt thank you to the staff for supporting me and getting me through this. And, and it was a really emotional moment. So we log off Facebook and we're done, and then Jeremiah sticks his little hand up, and then it's like, honey, you got to go to the bathroom? And no, no. You got a question? Yeah. Can I speak? And we were like, well, sure. Give that boy a microphone. Honey you know you could've heard a pin drop.

STEPHANIE STUART:

The whole building was quiet and he takes the little microphone and he says, "I think everybody should be treated equally, because after all, we are." That boy stole my heart, and right there in that moment, I knew why I was there that day. All of a sudden everything had a purpose because if that was the only child we reached that day, we made a difference and he got it. And he will go from there and, and spread it out to the rest of the kids.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Because, and that's what we encourage them to do. When we give them these books to take home with them, take this book home and call your friends over and y'all sit down and read it together. It just, it promotes so much, the reading, the education, the binding of friendships, you know? So, but yeah, that little, that little boy was incredible. Little Jeremy and little Alana. I love her dearly. Her momma, Robyn, they've been big supporters of mine. They've been at all the story hours. And Alana drew me a picture, it's up on the refrigerator,

STEPHANIE STUART:

and she's doing good in school. And we had one of our story hour children who got a perfect score on that Florida assessment test. I don't know that we had anything to do with it, but you never know. You never know.

BETSY KALIN:

That's great. That's great. Thank you. Thank you for sharing those stories. I'm going to go more into your activism now. Do you want to take a break or have any water?

STEPHANIE STUART:

I've got my teeth right here. I'll just take a little swallow. Cause I am getting kind of dry mouth. Honey, my bears last night at bingo bought me a gallon, yes, a gallon of Jim Beam Black to celebrate my cancer free. And I don't have the heart to tell him I quit drinking, I quit drinking. I stopped, I stopped even before the cancer.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And then once the cancer came through that, it was like, okay, never again. Cause that's something that will tear your immune system down too. So I tried to stay away from all of it, but I couldn't say no to that. What was I to do? We didn't open it. I'll take it to Oz.

BETSY KALIN:

Yeah. The other thing that's really not good for cancer is sugar. So I'm always telling people, you know, no sugar.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Yeah. Then from the minute they diagnosed me, I cut out all sugar. And then the minute I found out I was cured. Well, okay. I forgot. I cleaned off the cabinet. I had a bag of Reeses Cups on top. Oh goodness.

BETSY KALIN:

Let's talk about, you know, your needing to help other people and impact other people's lives and why that's so important to you. And why you are in activism for all of these different things in your life.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Someone once asked me, why are you an activist? Why do you do what you do? Why do you care so much? And the reason is because I don't want anybody taking the same journey I went through. I don't want you thrown out on the street at 18 with no clue as to where to go or what to do or who to get food from. I don't want you abused.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I don't want you an alcoholic trying to find your way. I don't want you to be a recovering drug addict. I don't want you to have HIV and I don't want you to have cancer. But if any of that comes along, I've been through it. And I'm going to share my story with you. And hopefully that'll help you get through it. And that, that's what I do. I, I, I'm in a really good place in life right now. I'm the poster child for government services, but I'm very comfortable. And when you get to that,

STEPHANIE STUART:

it's like Barack Obama said, I don't mean to be political, but that man nailed it on the head. When you have success and you get up to where you want to be, you don't just stand there and you don't run off and party. You turn around, you put your hand down and you offer the person behind you the next step that they need. And that's how I feel about things. I'm in a good place in life now. I want to help people. And even when I've not been in comfortable places, I do what I can with my basic needs of life program. Our motto was we can't do everything,

STEPHANIE STUART:

but we do everything we can. And I believe in that, you know, you may not be able to go buy a whole bunch of food for the food pantry, but find that neighbor of yours that might appreciate a good roast or, or a spaghetti dinner, take the stuff to them, let them cook it, and, you know, give them some independence that way. This earring's killing me. But yeah, I have, I always will help people. I always will help people. Even with the cancer, I've got three people now

STEPHANIE STUART:

that I'm, I guess you could say counseling with, talking with them, supporting them. They've just started their cancer journeys. And it's, it's amazing how it's three different, totally different scenarios with their cancers. Totally different scenarios. Completely different treatment plans. But, but I went through it, and I survived it. So I'm here to help the next cancer patient that needs me survive it and get through it. And I'm doing the same thing with HIV and, and being transgender.

BETSY KALIN:

And, and you talked about benefits that are held for you in each County.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh yeah. When I was diagnosed with my cancer, I was diagnosed in May. The pandemic started in March, and I was okay with it. Things were set, things were open, that's right. The governor had opened up the bars and stuff against everybody's judgment, but whatever.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And so the bars that I worked at decided to have benefits for me, for my cancer. There was a benefit at Christophs in Tampa. There was one at quench lounge in Largo, and they did one for me at hamburger Mary's in Clearwater. And it was really nice to have the quote unquote Tri County Area come together and, and do for me. I mean, I've helped these people all years. And I don't say that though, "I helped them all my life. They should be doing that for me." No, they didn't have to do a damn thing for me, but they chose to,

STEPHANIE STUART:

and I'm really grateful that they did, cause that, that afforded me the opportunity to have everything I needed to get through my cancer treatment. I didn't want for a thing. And I was as comfortable as I could have been when they're frying your butt with radiation. But yeah, it just shows you, you support a community and that community is going to support you. It takes a village, but make sure you're just as much a part of that village as you'd want them to be a part of you.

BETSY KALIN:

I think, you know, something to them, a lot of people across the country might not realize is that the community and being involved in the community is so important because there's still so much hatred and discrimination. And, you know, can you talk a little bit about like, you know, like the different experiences that you've had living where you're living and what some of that has been like?

STEPHANIE STUART:

I am very concerned about this current wave of attacks on our transgender children in this country. That worries me a lot. It worries me to death. Honestly, I was a little sick about that last week. I've dealt with that myself. It's a big sports issue. And growing up as a boy who really was a girl, I had no interest in sports anyway, but the fact that they're going after our kids like that is, is just traumatic.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I've had some uncomfortable experiences along the way. I went out on a date with a guy and I didn't tell him. Because I was still trying, you know, you didn't know whether you did or you didn't, should I, or shouldn't. We went out, we had a great time, but when I told him it was awful. I'm lucky, I didn't, you know, worse happened to me than what did, but I've dealt with that. There's been some discrimination in housing that I've had to deal with where everything was okay, but they'd find out.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And then it wasn't okay. And I had a great job. I was working for a law firm, a very prominent lawyer. And he decided he wanted to run for office, a Republican office. And he ran background checks on everybody in the office and there it was. And there I was out the door, he fired me that afternoon. And yeah, he's not a Senator anymore, but I'm still a trans woman. Okay. But but I've, I've had some issues along the way,

STEPHANIE STUART:

but you know, fortunately now, and I hope this will be a new trend and less than these attacks on our transgender children, we have human rights ordinances in Pinellas County, and I believe in Hillsborough County also. And those will protect you from being treated that way. You can't be fired from your job for being trans. You can't be put out of housing or a hotel because you're a member of the LGBTQ community. They have a task force that you get a hold of. And there's a liaison

STEPHANIE STUART:

between the Sheriff's department and the LGBTQ community. So those are safe places. Pasco does not have that. We were working on it before the pandemic and has since kind of fallen apart, but I'd like to see more of that across the country. I think what we have now in government is going to help the LGBTQ community a lot, especially my trans brothers and sisters.

BETSY KALIN:

Beautiful. Thank you, you went exactly where I wanted you to. That was great.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Can we take a minute?

BETSY KALIN:

Yes, of course. Yes. I know those earrings are bothering you.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh, damn.

BETSY KALIN:

You can leave them off if you want.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I probably will. I hate to, because they're pretty.

BETSY KALIN:

They are very sparkly.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I decided to do a mix of it all: a little drag, a little real girl, a little show girl, cause it takes all that to make me, so.

BETSY KALIN:

Yeah. Another thing that you mentioned was when you were stopped on the way home in drag.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Yeah. You know, back in the early days before you could, well, just back in the early days, let's start there. Back in the early days, even before me, there was a time, Heather Fontaine was telling me, there was a time where you had to show up at the club, dressed as a boy,

STEPHANIE STUART:

in order to do a female impersonation show. And she was telling me when she did shows in Vegas, they had a medical doctor that would come in and do exams to prove and confirm that, yes, indeed, you are a female impersonator. And when I started working, it wasn't nearly like that, things had improved a little bit, but you still had to be very, very careful. And one night I was headed home from work in drag, and the cops pulled me over. I hadn't had my name changed yet.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And he was not nice. He was very difficult, very rude to me, but he knew my dad. And that was kind of a good thing and a bad thing. Cause I got the, what do you, does your father know what you're doing? My father didn't give a damn. And besides, what difference did that make? But fortunately it worked out to where he let me go, but it was still very, very uncomfortable. There was another time I was in downtown Lakeland and I was just going around town. I was dressed as Stephanie having a Stephanie day.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I got pulled over for a speeding ticket. And the cop came up with the ID because I had my female picture, but the male name, cause I could do that at the driver's license office. And the cop looked at it, looked at me, is this really you? Yeah, it is. Is that illegal? Well, no, just weird. And he wrote me my ticket. And the day when I talked about changing my name and quitting my job that day, I went to the driver's license office.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I walk up to the counter and I hand the lady everything she needs. And she's looking down, she's looking it up, she's looking down, she's looking up. Looks down again and looks at me and she says, do you know Jesus loves you? I said, honey, I sure do. If God didn't love me, I wouldn't be the beautiful passable woman I am today. May I have my driver's license please? Yeah. Sometimes you just have to put them in their place. But yeah, the experiences with cops have been unpleasant.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And to this day, my mother used to say refrain from the appearance of evil. If you're not doing anything wrong, you're not going to get caught. And I have things I do wrong, but I am very careful and know, I, I don't even want an interaction with a cop. I don't want to talk to a cop. I don't want to, I don't want to be anywhere where a cop is. I'm just terrified of them to be honest. I really am afraid that something's going to happen to me just because of who I am.

BETSY KALIN:

Wow. Well, thank you. Thank you for sharing that and being open about it.

STEPHANIE STUART:

That's very upfront these days.

BETSY KALIN:

Yeah. I mean, we're seeing right now so many places around the country that are, you know, trying to deal with the issue, you know, what do we do with the police? What do we do. So something else that you briefly mentioned, you talked earlier about,

BETSY KALIN:

you know, growing up in the church, and about your spirituality, and I wanted to know like, how does that factor into you fighting for others and your resilience and strength?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Well, I am deeply spiritual. I am, I grew up Southern Baptist. As I said earlier, I was heavily involved with the church with different things and really felt my Senior year that I was turning my life over to God

STEPHANIE STUART:

and I was going to work for him. I even stepped down the Island and told the church that, but little did I know what kind of work God had in store for me. And my work didn't involve the church. It involved the community. And after I left that church, several years later, I got involved with a church. A lady asked me to come play the piano at her church. She knew the situation, so I felt very comfortable. And I went and played, was having a great time.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And then she came, she was a patient of ours at the doctor's office I was working for. And she came out there one day at work and told me that we needed to go to the pastor and have a chat. And I was like, about what? Well, he knows. What does he know? Well, he knows about you. Oh, okay. Well, does he know about you? Does he know about you and your husband that aren't married and living in sin? Because if we're going to go have a discussion, let's talk about it all. And unfortunately that brought that to an end.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And then, and then the gay church in Lakeland opened up and opened their doors. I went and played the piano for them. And we eventually had Ali's funeral there. They opened the church for us for that. And, but you know, after, after she died, I didn't feel so much about Christianity as I did about spirituality. The experiences that I had taking care of her during her seizures or while she was dreaming at night.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Some of the things I saw led me to believe that, you know, it was far more than Christianity. It was about spirituality because I was seeing spirits. She was talking to people that were already dead and gone, and we were getting help from them. And it really, it really changed my thinking here and here. And I consider myself now a spiritualist because I hear the voices. I don't hear the crazy voices. I hear the voices that tell me, you need to go enter this pageant. You're not going to win, but we want you there.

STEPHANIE STUART:

You need to go to this celebration. There's a pageant, there's a benefit coming up, we want you to be a part of that. I go where I'm compelled. I'm told where to go pretty much. And that's what I do. I don't have a booking agent or anything like that. It may sound cliche, but God is my booking agent. And where there's a need, that's where I go.

BETSY KALIN:

And that's perfect. Thank you. Thank you. I think that is so important to really listen,

BETSY KALIN:

listen to, you know, maybe if you want to call them like spirit guides or angels or whatever, right?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Whatever you want to refer to that voice inside of you. Go ahead and refer to it that way. But the most important thing is to listen to it. When it tells you don't do that, don't do it. If it says, go over here, go over there. Cause it will never steer you wrong.

BETSY KALIN:

Beautiful. Stephanie, something else that I wanted to talk about was that you helped fight for transgender rights.

BETSY KALIN:

And you know, can you tell me about transgender day of visability and transgender day of remembrance and just kind of talk about your work there?

STEPHANIE STUART:

We just had March 31st was this year's transgender, it's every year, transgender day of visibility. But March 31st was this year. And this one, this one was especially heartfelt for me because it had been 38 years since dad threw me out and it was on Easter weekend that he did it.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And the two combined this year together. But transgender visibility is a great day. I don't do much for it really. I post on Facebook, put my flyers out, and support my brothers and sisters. I don't know what else I can do for that day. The big day that I do is in November, and that's the transgender day of remembrance. And that's the day that we remember the brothers and sisters that we've lost for various reasons. A lot of it is domestic violence because we want to bring attention to domestic violence.

STEPHANIE STUART:

But we're not going to turn our back on that when they committed suicide or, or the one that may have gotten shot, you know, various reasons, various reasons. We remember them all because they're our brothers and sisters and I've done those services for years. I speak at them. We had one here. I've said earlier, I try not to have too much interaction with cops. Well, we had a transgender day of visibility here in New Port Richey and Denise Johnson put it together

STEPHANIE STUART:

and she actually got the Pasco County Sheriff's department to come out. And there were me and sheriff NACO hand-in-hand, side by side. And it was nice. It was nice. It didn't last long, but it was nice. And I tried to do as much as I can for that. The life expectancy of a transgender woman of color is 36 years. That night, at transgender day of remembrance,

STEPHANIE STUART:

a speaker started off her speech, very calmly, "36". And she got a little more passionate about it, 36. And she got a little concerned, 36. And then she got angry, 36. And then she explained what 36 was, the life expectancy of a trans woman of color is 36 years. We have to do better. We have to do better. It doesn't matter what lifestyle our sisters are living. They don't deserve to die because of them, not at all.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I've had some situations in my own life I've had to deal with. And I've seen some of my sisters go through some things, and I really would like to see that change. If you need help, please reach out. The help is there. We'll get you through it.

BETSY KALIN:

Where do you go for services in your County and in your area?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Because of the pandemic, things are changing. I'm not sure I want to support a particular organization

STEPHANIE STUART:

because they just ousted one of their transgender therapists who is transgender. And he was leading the weekly support group. And they ousted him to put a cis-gender man in his place. And I'm not real happy about that. I'm not, I'm trying not to speak out on it until I have all the facts and know exactly what's going on down there. I know the pandemic has changed a lot of things, a lot of things that were here for us before may not be available to us now.

STEPHANIE STUART:

But my son, my two sons go to Metro health for their trend, for their tea and their testosterone. And I know I have some sisters that go to transgender health for theirs too. And they've got offices, their offices were growing really quickly before the pandemic. And something may have changed by now, but they're in new port Richey, Tampa, St. Pete, Clearwater, they do a lot. Another organization is EPIC,

STEPHANIE STUART:

Empath Partners in Care. If I'm not mistaken, they're not so well known for it, but they do also offer transgender services and they offer medical services on a sliding scale. They've got a food pantry also. And I was Miss EPIC in 2017, but I, I believe in that group. In fact, the two shows I'm doing tonight, the first one is to benefit EPIC and the second one is to benefit Metro, and their HIV services, so.

BETSY KALIN:

Great. I knew I had to ask you that. So

STEPHANIE STUART:

Girl, between me, between me and you, it's Metro that I'm not so thrilled with. They had, they had a whole team of trans gender therapists working with transgender people, and now they are all gone. There were five of them. We now have one. Yeah. And I want to know what's going on down there. Is it just simple as financial cuts? You just don't have the money anymore. What is it? So yeah.

BETSY KALIN:

Yeah. That's a good question. That's a great question.

STEPHANIE STUART:

You do not have permission to use that.

BETSY KALIN:

Okay. I know you've talked about Allie quite a bit. And what, what would you like? What are some assumptions that people make about you and your sexuality that you want to clarify?

STEPHANIE STUART:

I've not really had an issue with people in my sexuality. I'm pansexual,

STEPHANIE STUART:

I guess, if you have to put a label on it. I've thought about that since we've got these new letters, new labels, I thought, where exactly is it that I fit in? There really isn't a spot. Cause I'm all of the above. I had a husband, I had a wife and then I had a trans man. And maybe there'll be another relationship. Lord knows what it's going to be. I don't mean what. Lord knows who's coming along. But the lesson I've learned, the lesson I've learned is that love will come at you from any direction.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Don't ever be afraid of the package its wrapped in, because it's love. And it's going to fill your heart and fill your life. And that's what Alison did to me. When we first met, I thought this can't be, she's a girl, I'm a transgender woman. I'm supposed to be dating this six foot hunky God, not this beautiful five foot two woman. And it took about two weeks. And then she changed my mind and things went on from there.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And, and we, we had a few friends along the way that, that weren't very supportive and, and turned away from us. But you know, that was their loss. That was their loss. We had a great network of people that really did support us. And even through her medical journey, we really didn't have much issue there. I let them know who I was and why I was here. And they didn't ask any more questions after that.

BETSY KALIN:

I think something else that you had mentioned in your pre-interview about Alison that I really loved hearing was that you would go as a drag queen and she would go as a drag king.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Yes. Oh yes. Oh my Alison, I miss her so much. And it's amazing how you can miss someone that's been gone longer than you were together. She's been gone 10 years now. We were together seven. And along about the second year we were together, she decided she wanted to do drag king. And we had the Waterside landing pageant coming up. She wanted to enter. And it was,

STEPHANIE STUART:

it wasn't so easy along the way we got everything. We were at Walmart of all places buying stuff for her, and I get to the register and she has this complete meltdown. I'm a girl. I don't wear this stuff. I don't know what we're doing. And we can attribute that to the cancer. We left Walmart. And then a couple of days later, she comes to me, very timidly, Ms. Stephanie, I want to do that thing. And I knew exactly what she meant. So we got everything together and Kathryn and I got together and put this nice package together for her.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And she won. She won every category that night. Blew them out of the water, but it, it really made her a star. And it was nice doing shows with her because we could travel together and we'd come home with all the money. It didn't matter where we went or where we were at or who we were doing shows for. Cause if, if they didn't like me, they loved her. If they didn't care for what she was doing, they loved what I was doing. And we had a lot of great times. We went to Fort Lauderdale

STEPHANIE STUART:

and did a couple shows together down there. Did a lot of shows at the Waterside landing together. And some of the duets we did together were just, yeah, get my heart, get my heart. But yeah, it surprises me how much you can miss somebody that's been gone longer than they were in your life to begin with. But the, the minute, the minute I met her, I knew she was going to change my life. And then after we got married Lord, when she brought up marriage, Oh my God.

STEPHANIE STUART:

She told me we were getting married. She didn't ask, there was no bending on the knee or anything. She was like, we need to get married. And it was like, what we just met. We met in October, she moved in in November, in December, and then in January we got married. It was just that fast. But when she brought it up to me, I was like married, no. Again, thinking this isn't the way it's supposed to be. It takes me a while sometimes, but it didn't take long. It was a few days later

STEPHANIE STUART:

I came to my senses and then I went to her and we went to the courthouse on the 13th and applied for a marriage license. And then Thursday, January 16th at nine o'clock in the morning we got married and we are forever in the books in Polk County, Florida as Mr. And Mrs. Stephanie Ann Stuart Wilson. The marriage certificate says Stephanie Ann Stuart Wilson, groom, Alison Michelle Perry, bride.

STEPHANIE STUART:

So take that one, daddy, I'm immortalized.

BETSY KALIN:

No, that's such a good start. I'm so glad I asked you about that. Thank you.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh, oh, you're so welcome.

BETSY KALIN:

So something else that I wanted to talk about with you was, you know, what do you regard as the most significant change

BETSY KALIN:

that LGBTQ people experienced today. You know, as compared to like, you know, 50 years ago. Like what's happened and what still needs to happen?

STEPHANIE STUART:

This may be a little thing, but the medical side of being transgender is a lot better than it's ever been. You've got facial feminization surgeries, you've got surgeries for your hips, surgeries for your breasts, you know,

STEPHANIE STUART:

and then the sexual reassignment surgery itself has far advanced. And for the boys, the top surgery has really come a long way. And I read somewhere yesterday about further advancements in bottom surgery for the boys too. So in that regard, we've come a long way with that. What we're not a long way with is equality and respect. We're still looked at as sex toys and fantasies and freaks. And we're not. And, and the ironic thing about today in this time, not today specifically,

STEPHANIE STUART:

but the time we're in, is that with all these changes that we've been making medically we're everywhere, and you don't know it. Nobody's wearing a sign that says "hey, I'm trans" and we're not looking that part anymore, so to speak. A lot more passibility. And there is a higher level of acceptability. When my son and I Taz went to Disney last year for our Christmas vacation, we were waiting to get in for Mickey's Christmas party.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And there was a very obvious transgender woman working for Disney, standing there had her hat on, her name was Karen. She looked so cute. She was checking people in. And Taz is like, come over here. I said, no, I'm going to her. I want her to check me in. But she's there. She's a transgender woman. She's on the front line at Disney. She's not in the kitchen. She's not doing the trash. She's not the maid cleaning the room. She was on the front line. And we have the same thing at the post office here in Port Richey. There's, there's a transgender woman behind the counter.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And there she is right on the front line. They don't have her in the back, sorting the mail. She's not out in the truck. She is on the front line. And in those regards, it's nice. But this attack on transgender children. I mean, my God, if they're going to go after our kids like that, what are they going to do to the adults? What are they going to do to us? It worries me. I worry about us being rounded up, like the Jews were in Nazi Germany.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I fear that. I hope to God, it never happens, but it's one of my fears.

BETSY KALIN:

Do you, I mean, are you working with any group that works with trans kids? Is there anything in Florida that's doing that kind of work?

STEPHANIE STUART:

I know Metro does. And in the last 10 years, I've worked with two other trans kids. And I mean,

STEPHANIE STUART:

these were kids. A very dear friend of mine from Lakeland called me one day and said, I don't know what to do. My seven year old daughter has told me that she's not male, nor female, has no sexual preference, and from now on, would like to be addressed as X. And so I gave her my advice. That was the beginning of the summer. And at the end of the summer, I got a picture of the most handsome young man going to a summer camp dance

STEPHANIE STUART:

and it was X and he looked just incredible, just incredible. And then I have friends up in Jacksonville that, they were actually friends with my cousin, and it was a similar situation, but their trans child was a teenager. And they wanted us to come up there and go have dinner and let sit and talk about what we can do for our transgender child. And that, that, that was kind of cleansing too.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I got through some pain in that one too. But to this day, I still hear from him. I got an invitation to his graduation and he is now in college and he is headed to work with special needs children.

BETSY KALIN:

Oh, that's fantastic.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Yeah. That's a good success story.

BETSY KALIN:

So you've mentioned cousins, but do you any contact at all with your family?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Well that, that's a little painful right now because there's a lot going on in my family.

STEPHANIE STUART:

When my father did what he did, I did what I did, and I was 18. So I just assumed he meant the entire family. I thought everybody in my family felt that way. And it was their mission to make sure that I did, because I guess that was some attempt that, well, if, if she feels like the family doesn't want her around, then maybe she'll change her ways. And I didn't, I didn't, but seven years later,

STEPHANIE STUART:

my grandfather died. And there's anger there because they robbed me of the last seven years of my grandfather's life. But I went to the funeral and I did it as, I didn't do it as Stephanie. I didn't. I cut my nails, slicked my hair all back, had this beautiful purple pony tail. And off I went to this funeral trying to be a boy, but my grandma God love her, she didn't care. She didn't care. And that first Thanksgiving after pap was gone, she wanted me to come for Thanksgiving.

STEPHANIE STUART:

So I sit down and write her this heartfelt four-page letter of who I am, what I am, what I've been through, and that I love her, you know, spilling my heart and soul out. And my grandma in true fashion sent me a postcard: "You are my grandchild. I love you. I'll see you Thanksgiving day." And that was that, that was that. My aunt Nancy, who has been a second mother to me my whole life, she was here last week, spent the week with me. She just left.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And we were talking about that cause she, she didn't realize it. That was the deception. She thought that I, I wasn't contacting the family because those seven years were my years of transition. And it wasn't that way. They were not my years of transition. That was mom and daddy saying, they don't want to talk to you. Nobody's going to love you like that. So you need to do something about that. And but yeah, the family issue, and, and the other thing about family right now is

STEPHANIE STUART:

that two weeks ago, my dad went in the hospital. He couldn't breathe. He was in full renal failure and all full of fluid. It was pressing on his lungs. They got that taken care of and tried to do a heart cath on him and couldn't do it. Long story short, Monday, this hurts to say, Monday, not Monday, on Tuesday, my father had a triple bypass. But I'm happy to say that just before I went to do this interview, I got a text message from my dad

STEPHANIE STUART:

and he is very much alive and well. So I think he's gonna make it. My wife used to tell me that because of the way they treated me, she was not going to let my parents into heaven. I came first, they were going to have to wait. And I prayed to her and said, please don't let daddy suffer. God's will be done, but don't let daddy suffer and see, we both get what we want. He's not in heaven and he's not suffered.

STEPHANIE STUART:

So we both got what we want on that. But in spite of what they've done to me and how they've treated me, and, and even as recently as my brother's birthday in February. Super Bowl Sunday, the bucks are in the super bowl. It's Kevin's birthday. They always get together for the game. And I messaged mom and was like, why don't we make this a birthday party for Kevin? And she said, Oh, we're just having a simple dinner. We'll do this another time. And unfortunately, another time hasn't presented itself yet.

STEPHANIE STUART:

But, but that's what I deal with. But I love them anyway, they're my parents. And like I said to someone, just because they're my parents, they get respect. This much. They don't get this much, but they get this much, because they deserve that. They're my parents. And you know, none of the three of us got the life cards we really thought we should have had, you know. But we made the best of it.

BETSY KALIN:

But I'm happy to hear that you do have, you know, people who are part of your family who are supportive and loving. And

STEPHANIE STUART:

My aunt Nancy is just incredible. Just incredible. I can pick up the phone and call her with any need and she will take care of it or drive down here and have Dan drop her off. She's a little feeble. She needs a week, but a wheelchair, but yeah.

BETSY KALIN:

Okay. And something else that I wanted to ask you is what are some things

BETSY KALIN:

that you haven't really talked about that you feel like are important to mention in this interview?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Let's see, we've covered a lot today. We've really covered a lot. And I don't think there's anything we haven't talked about, but if there's an opportunity to leave you with one thought, leave you with whoever's going to see this. And that thought is that if I can do it, you can too.

STEPHANIE STUART:

You can too. It's going to take a lot of strength, find your spirituality, build your village, but you can do it. You can do it. And, and when you're alone, like they say, when you're alone and you're down, go find somebody to help. Cause that'll make you feel real good about yourself. Real good. I went to a pantry. I go to a lot of food pantries. I went to one a few weeks ago and they just loaded me down. Well, I'm a single woman. I don't need all that food. But I went to four different neighbors in my neighborhood

STEPHANIE STUART:

and spread that food and that love around. And that's what you do. That's how you take care of each other. To my trans kids, please don't give up, don't give up. I made it to 18. You can make it to 18. And when you get to 18, you're on your own. You can do what you want. You don't have to answer to anybody. And then you can be who you are, whatever that is. And the thought that, yes, the only thing we ever have to be in life is ourselves.

STEPHANIE STUART:

You just have to figure out what that is. Don't ever try to be anything you're not, cause you'll run into barriers and obstacles that won't be comfortable. But when you're yourself and you're doing what you're supposed to do in life it's a lot simpler and a lot easier. And if there's anything I can help find me, anything I can help with find me. Because that's what I do. I love to help in any way I can. I've got a lot of great people that help me and support me. And I'm returning that favor as you should too.

BETSY KALIN:

Beautiful. Beautiful, Stephanie. So at the end of our interview we just ask some four questions and they're just supposed to be like off the top of your head, your short kind of answers to these questions.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Q&A speed round, huh?

BETSY KALIN:

Exactly. Exactly. Or kind of like a little bit like the match game.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Okay.

BETSY KALIN:

So, if you could tell your 15 year old self, anything, what would it be?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Hang in there. The future is a lot brighter than the present.

BETSY KALIN:

Great. Thank you. And do you think there's such a thing as a queer superpower and if so, what is it?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Is there a queer superpower? Well, they say we're all made in God's image. So is he queer or is he trans?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Is he gay? I'm not sure. But that's who I turn to for my spirituality. And he seems to love everybody, queers too. So I guess that's my answer for that one. I don't, I don't see a queer superhero out there.

BETSY KALIN:

So why is it important to you to tell your story?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Hmm. It is very important to me down to the bottom of my soul to share my story in hopes that I can help someone through a similar journey, be it transgender, whether you're coming out as gay, if you just got diagnosed with cancer, if you're dealing with HIV, if you know someone that's HIV positive, any of those things, those are the experiences of my life. And I don't want my life to be in vain. I've got a lot of crowns. I've won a lot of titles and yes, as glorious as that is,

STEPHANIE STUART:

that's not the meat and potatoes of life. That's just what pays the bills and provides the opportunities. And I wanna make sure that if there is someone that has walked down the same path, I want the path to be smoother for you than it was for me.

BETSY KALIN:

Beautiful. Thank you. And OUTWORDS is the first national project to capture and share our history through in-depth interviews. What do you think is the importance of a project like OUTWORDS? And if you could mention OUTWORDS in your answer, that would be great.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I am really happy that OUTWORDS contacted me to do this, because it's been on my heart for about five years now, even before the cancer, it's been on my heart, that I wanted to leave something here. I want there to be a permanent, not a monument, but a permanent something, a permanent. That's it, a permanent footprint that I have left on this earth and OUTWORDS has provided me that opportunity

STEPHANIE STUART:

by archiving the video I am now leaving my footprint, my size nine and a half open toe red pump footprint. Thank you OUTWORDS. I appreciate this.

BETSY KALIN:

I am just going to look through because we still have a little bit of time and I don't want to let you go early. I want to make sure I get everything.

BETSY KALIN:

You haven't really talked that much about other, you mentioned some names here and there, but is there anyone else you'd like to mention who has had a positive impact on the LGBTQ community that you could talk about?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh my goodness. I could list all afternoon on this one. But the first one that comes to mind is a very dear friend of mine, a sister of mine, Alexis DeLamer. She's helped me out tremendously, but she is also one that is always there for the community. Anytime you need her for a benefit for whatever,

STEPHANIE STUART:

the reason she's right there. I've got a new friend Ms. JC Ray, who is another one that does a lot of community service. She's a little sarcastic, she's got an edge to her, but sister works hard for the community and that's what's important to me. I'm trying to think there might be some names I'm going to leave out. My sons, my three boys, they keep me going. They inspire me. And one's an entertainer. One used to be an entertainer.

STEPHANIE STUART:

He's got a day job. And the third one has a girlfriend and he's moved off to Georgia. But they're my boys, you know? And I love them to death. They gave me the best Mother's Day last year, best Mother's Day of my life last year, right before the cancer, ironically. But they're great people. I love them to death. And Tiffany Roseano. I mentioned her earlier, she got my story at OUTWORDS started. Joanie Hemsworth who owns the paperback book exchange.

STEPHANIE STUART:

She hosted our first Drag Queen Story Hour in Pasco County. And she's been a dear friend and supporter, provided our books for us there. You know, and I also, I have to put a shout out to Kori Stevens. Kori and I aren't close friends, but Kori is the director of St. Pete Pride, the Miss St. Pete Pride pageant. And she has worked tirelessly probably the last 15 years, I think now in St. Pete, with St. Pete Pride. And then she did the same thing with Tampa Pride.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And she's another one that just gives endlessly to the community. And Muffy van Beaver Housen. I love you dearly. I'm angry because you have moved to Georgia, but she's another one that yeah, she's, she's a big community supporter. She's part of the group called Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. They are drag queen nuns and they go around collecting money and I have seen them at tea dances with their cute little pocket books open.

STEPHANIE STUART:

"Do you have any spare change? Would you like to donate some spare change?" And girl, they raised some money that way, they really do. But you know, there's, there's a lot of them in our community. We've got Georgia Moore, who's working at Punky's right now doing bingo every Tuesday night. She has set her a goal of raising $25,000 this year for the community. Every week, there's a different benefactor for the bingo. And she's rolling right along.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I'm sure she'll have her $25,000 in no time, maybe towards the end of the year. But gosh, I know I've forgotten somebody, but I'm so blessed to work with so many great girls that really care about the community.

BETSY KALIN:

That's, that's an amazing list.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Well then there's the group from Pasco Pride. We didn't even get into that one and we won't, but they're great people too.

BETSY KALIN:

And so how did you and your sons find each other? Like how did that happen.

STEPHANIE STUART:

That's been another evolution process. When I came to New Port Richey for my first booking, it was in January of 2011. And I met my first son Taz. We hit it off right away, came fast friends. And I was coming over here once a month, doing shows. And then in August of that same year of 2011, I moved to Clearwater. And it turned out, he lived right down the road from me in Clearwater. So he was able to show me where I needed to go for shopping and this and that.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And it's just evolved from there with him. He's been my son ever since. His birthday was yesterday, he is now 37 years old. I said, no, you're not. You're 27. I cannot pass for 35 if you were 37. But he's been a big supporter. He's always there for me. I was in a relationship that wasn't really that good. And him and my partner had had some words together. So we hadn't spoken for a while.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And when the relationship ended Taz called me and asked me a question and that question was: "Mama, is there anything I can do?" And I thought, that's my boy. That's my boy. And then Chris, my other son, all three of my sons are trans boys. Chris, I met here in New Port Richey, long before he transitioned to Chris, and we've been friends for years. And then when he transitioned, that's when he became my son. He needed a mama. And bless his heart, his mama died of an aneurysm when he was 18 and I'm all too happy to be his mama.

STEPHANIE STUART:

He loves me, he respects me, he knows how to take good care of me. And then there's RJ. When we met, we'd known each other, but then we really got close while we were Mr. And Mrs. Pasco Pride. And then doing Story Hour, really brought us closer together. And last year when we were doing the online Story Hour, I knew I had a problem. There was something going on. I needed to go get it checked out.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And I asked him if he'd go with me to the emergency room. And he did. And he was there with me when, when they, they didn't diagnose me there. They just told me to go see a surgeon that things were serious, but he was there that night. He got me through that. And then during cancer, when I was in the bottom, I was having a really bad Friday and I called him and I'm like, can you, I need your help. I can't do anything. I can't walk. I can't get up off the couch. I need your help. And him and Mariah came over that night.

STEPHANIE STUART:

When they walked in the door, then picked up the vacuum cleaner and Mariah went straight to the kitchen and they got my house back together. Then they surprised me with a whole new bathroom set, shower, curtain, rugs, and everything. He tended my living room window for me. And he's like, well, mama, is there anything else we can do for you? And I said, you know, I'm, I'm scared tonight. I don't feel good. And I'm really worried about what's going to happen. Could you stay the night? And he did. And we sat up til almost four o'clock Saturday morning yacking.

STEPHANIE STUART:

But after they left, I got the best sleep I'd had in weeks. And then when I saw the doctor on Monday, before I could tell him my problems, he's like, you know, you're really making this treatment look very easy. You have taken this extremely difficult treatment and made it look like a walk in the park. You are literally kicking cancer's ass. And I was like, so I'm not going to die. This isn't killing me. And he said, no, we'll stop radiation for two weeks. You'll heal up and then we'll finish it.

STEPHANIE STUART:

And, and we did, we did. And RJ has been right here with me ever since. And he was supposed to be here today. I wanted him to come, so he could help with the setup of the technical and the set, because he did it so well with Story Time. But he had a family emergency. His mother had an emergency, so he had to go take care of her. But I think I did okay.

BETSY KALIN:

You did beautiful. It looks perfect.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Thank you.

BETSY KALIN:

Yeah. And I had no idea it was your kitchen.

STEPHANIE STUART:

He wanted, well, he wanted crowns. I could tell when he said you're in your kitchen, I'm like, yeah, it's a small apartment. And I don't have a place where I can open the window and get natural light and sit for two hours and be comfortable. So when he said, okay, we'll go with that. I thought, you know what? I cleaned off this shelf really quick, cleaned off the microwave cart behind me, and then went and got all the crowns, put them out.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I've got a sash or two out too. And my picture back up there. That picture behind me is actually from St. Pete Pride. That was my evening gown for Miss St. Pete Pride.

BETSY KALIN:

It's a gorgeous photo. It looks really good.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Robert Castelli took that.

BETSY KALIN:

It's beautiful. Let me just go through and see if there's anything I missed in our last couple minutes.

BETSY KALIN:

This is a fantastic interview, Stephanie. I mean, I have four pages of questions and you've taken us through all four pages.

STEPHANIE STUART:

It's like I said, darlin, you guys answered a prayer. This is exactly what I wanted to do. I wanted to leave my footprint. I want somebody to be able to look at my life and be like, well, if she got through that, then I can handle this.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Because I don't have, I don't have any children. My brother and I are the last remaining Wilsons from that side of the family. There's nobody to leave a legacy to. And this way, my legacy will go on. This way I'm here. I can come back from heaven and look at it myself.

BETSY KALIN:

So what do you want to see in the future happen?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Equality. Equality, equality, equality.

STEPHANIE STUART:

I want us to be looked at like everybody else, like regular people, you know, I don't want us to be singled out because of sports. And I just, equality. That's the biggest thing screaming in my head right now is equality. Because it's not there.

BETSY KALIN:

And what would you like to see happen in Florida? Like what would you like to see change?

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh my. I want to see Val Demings as governor. And I'd like to see Ron DeSantis go to jail for what he did with the vaccines around here. But yeah, honestly, we do need to change the state of Florida, like Georgia did. Let's try to make it blue, as blue as we can. Because the new governor made an all-out assault attack on our trans kids. And like I said, and it looked like the bill had died in the Florida Senate

STEPHANIE STUART:

and wasn't passing through. And then last night in the middle of the night, under the cloak of darkness, they attach it to something else and it sails right through. And that's been heavy on me for the last couple of weeks, and now that it's gone through. I mean, I don't foresee it being put into place. You've made, you've created a fix for a problem that isn't there. But just the fact that they did it shows

STEPHANIE STUART:

that these people accept that kind of behavior. And that's not the way it should be. Everybody should have the equal opportunity to create or to make their dream come true. Whatever it is, everybody should have the opportunity for that.

BETSY KALIN:

Can you explain the bill for people who might not know?

STEPHANIE STUART:

I'm not sure exactly what it's called, but it's a bill that will prevent trans girls from playing in sports. And it's only addressed to the trans girls.

STEPHANIE STUART:

It does not address the trans boys. And the one section of this bill that really cooks my group is if you have two girls, let's say the wrestlers, and you have your winner and your loser. The loser steps up and says, you know what? I don't think technically she's a girl. I don't think biologically, she's a girl. They have the right to file that complaint. Then it falls on the responsibility of the other girl

STEPHANIE STUART:

and her family to pay for the examination that will be needed to prove that she is who she is. They are far more interested in getting into the pants of trans children than they are in correcting the unemployment system in the state of Florida. And that is just wrong on all accounts. All accounts. It makes me want to move. It really does.

STEPHANIE STUART:

That's scary at my age, but because yeah, it's a Republican led government up there and that assault on the trans kids was just deplorable.

BETSY KALIN:

Well, I hope you don't move and, I hope you stay and fight so I can join you in the fight.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh thank you, thank you. Well, it's like I said, it's a solution for a problem we don't have.

STEPHANIE STUART:

So, I don't foresee this going anywhere. It's not really going to do anything. It's just the fact that it's there. It is blocking an opportunity for a trans child. Cause, like I said, growing up myself, I had no interest in sports. And I don't know of trans women that would aspire to be athletic. But if there is one, she needs to be able to have all the opportunities that everybody else does without that damn examination.

BETSY KALIN:

Exactly. Exactly. Well, Stephanie, now we have now reached the end of our interview.

BETSY KALIN:

I just want to say this has been such a pleasure.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for letting me get some of this out because yeah, I've not dealt with things over the years and this is another opportunity for that.

BETSY KALIN:

Well, you're a beautiful person and a wonderful storyteller and I'm just, I'm so grateful that you were so open with us and willing to share your story.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. What do we do now?

BETSY KALIN:

So I think Kristie is going to come back and I'm gonna sign off. And I think she just has some, some finishing things.

KRISTIE TAIWO-MAKANJUOLA:

Yep. I'm just going to copy the stuff over. Thank you guys so much.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Oh thank you, darling.

BETSY KALIN:

I'm going to sign off. Thank you again, Stephanie. It was really a pleasure.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Pleasure to work with you, honey. Thank you for making me comfortable.

BETSY KALIN:

Of course. Okay. Bye.

STEPHANIE STUART:

Bye bye now.

KRISTIE TAIWO-MAKANJUOLA:

All right, Stephanie. Great interview.