Klaudia Koronel

Koronel was born as Milfe Dacula and the eldest of six children in a small community in Zamboanga del Sur, Philippines. Her father was a carpenter and her mother was a beautician. They were also farmers. Although she didn't have dreams of becoming an actress as a kid, she loved listening to radio dramas and watching movies. Her parents divorced when she was five years old. After her mother abandoned their home, she had to care for her father who then left her and her young siblings to their grandmother when he went to the capital, Manila. While her father was with them, she was beaten on the head with a cooking ladle and chained.

Living in Iloilo under her strict but responsible grandmother, she was able to focus on her schooling. When she was 10 years old, her parents got back together again and they moved to Project 8, Quezon City. They experienced extreme poverty in their time there, with their house even getting demolished at one point. She continued experiencing abuse from her father, who would make them eat pages of their notebooks or bite their fingers. When she was a teenager, she nearly burned her legs when a flat iron fell near her knees. Despite their struggles, she was able to graduate elementary school at Bago Bantay Elementary and high school in San Francisco del Monte.