Monday night, during the first half of a two-part interview with Tavis Smiley, Prince spoke candidly for the first time about his struggle with his childhood epilepsy. The musical icon spoke about how his flamboyant persona was used to compensate for his childhood struggles with the condition and being teased as an adolescent.

“I’ve never spoken about this before but I was born epileptic,” Prince told Smiley in the interview. “I used to have seizures when I was young. My mother and father didn’t know what to do or how to handle it but they did the best they could with what little they had.”

Once more, Prince cites an encounter with an angel with helping him deal with the neurological disease.

Prince states, “my mother told me one day I walked in to her and said, ‘Mom, I’m not going to be sick anymore,’ and she said ‘Why?’ and I said ‘Because an angel told me so.’ Now, I don’t remember saying it, that’s just what she told me.”

The 50-year-old superstar has always been quite different, and this revelation of an angelic encounter doesn’t change that notion. However, he’s still cranking out hits with his 25th studio album LOtUSFLOW3R, which is in stores now.