Even before I officially met Brooke, I could already tell that she had a lot of personality. Through happenstance, she ended up sitting right next to me at my previous job and we got to know each other a bit. You can learn a lot about someone from sitting next to them every day.
Through getting to know Brooke, I learned about her epic love story with her wife Chelsea. They talk about their journey on their YouTube channel called BerrySwirl, which they started to document their life and inspire others. Here’s your chance to get to know Brooke & Chelsea Berry a little bit better!
Tell us about yourself in a tweet.
Hate. Love. Heartbreak. Miracles. Marriage. This is us!
Where are you from?
Brooke was born and raised in Los Angeles, while Chelsea was born and raised in Las Vegas.
What brought you to LA?
Las Vegas can be a very toxic place. Chelsea moved to Newbury Park, CA with her dad sophomore year of high school. After graduation she moved back to Las Vegas, only to find herself back in California a couple years later!
What’s your favorite thing about LA?
The diversity – you can drive 20 minutes in any direction and end up in a different kind of community with different cultures and different walks of life.
Where is your favorite place to go?
Our favorite place probably has to be West Hollywood for the sheer fun of club hopping and you can ALWAYS make friends in WeHo. We’ve met the most amazing characters out there.
What is your favorite neighborhood?
Our favorite neighborhood is definitely Venice Beach. It’s so low maintenance and so beautiful. Plus, there are always the best photo ops!
What has been your favorite LA experience?
We’ve had some pretty great experiences in LA but there are two that stick out the most. We attended the 2015 MTV Movie Awards which was a total blast! We also got to be a part of the Pitch Perfect 2 Premiere and had the opportunity to meet so many people and some of the amazing actors that were a part of the film.
What inspired you to start your YouTube channel?
We’ve always known our love story was unique. While everyone likes to think their love is “special”, we have been in love since we were 17. Ironically enough, we hated one another. Until we got paired together for a class project in high school, and literally two weeks after that we exchanged the words “I love you”. Eight years later, on April 4, 2015 we finally got married!
We truly believe that there is that one person in life that you just get. You don’t have to learn about them to decide if they’re “the one”. You simply know it from day one. We have so many strikes against them: We’re young, Brooke’s black and Chelsea’s white, etc. But we refuse to believe in all the reasons it won’t work, and believe in the one reason that it will – because we love each other whole- heartedly. We are at our most complete with each other by their side.
Whether you’re gay or not, we believe there is something in their story for everyone, whether you’ve dealt with long distance, breakups, infidelity, we’ve experienced it all and here we are today, standing taller than ever before!
While we are an interracial, same sex couple, we’re not selling the idea of “odd couple love”, we’re selling the idea of true love, because we are living proof that it does exist.
What is your advice to other LA girls who want to start a YouTube channel?
Really hone in on the story you want to tell. Focus on the why rather than the what. People spend too much time thinking about what kind of content they want to create, when they should be pondering on why it is they want to create that content. It’s all about storytelling and telling it as authentically as you can.
How do you deal with haters and ignorance?
The nice thing is, we get a lot of love. I can count on one hand how many negative comments we’ve received. But when we do get those comments from time to time, we just try to picture a lonely person in front of a screen with nothing better to do than troll on a couple who’s clearly in love. We try not to let it get to us.