From 320 to 145: My Weight Loss Story, and Why I Do This Work
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I don’t usually lead with my own story. My job is to take care of you. But patients ask me sometimes during a consult, sometimes at checkout, sometimes weeks later when they feel comfortable enough:
“Have you been where I am?”
The answer is yes. So here it is.
I’m 54. I’m post‑menopausal. I’ve been at my peak weight and at my goal weight, and I’ve learned the hard way that neither one of those numbers is the whole story.
Where it started
In 2006, I was in a bad car accident. It put me out of work for about a year and a half. Between the chronic pain and the fact that I could barely move for a long stretch, I stopped exercising, stopped cooking, and started feeling sorry for myself. I laid on the couch. I got depressed. And the weight came on fifty, sixty pounds in the first year.
I didn’t know how to dig myself out. So I didn’t. Over the next few years my first marriage was falling apart, and my weight kept climbing. By 2010, going through a very painful divorce, I was at my peak around 320 pounds. A size 26.
I blamed myself because I was fat. I blamed the weight for everything for the marriage, for how I felt, for how invisible I thought I was. But that wasn’t really it. The weight was a symptom. The real problem was that I’d stopped taking care of me.
2009 — working, showing up, smiling for the camera. Also around 300 pounds and exhausted in ways I hadn’t admitted to myself yet.
The mirror moment
After the divorce, I looked in the mirror one day and said, enough.
I was tired of being a size 26. I’m a girl who loves to shop, and I hated going to the mall and only being able to walk into two stores out of fifty. My favorite thing in the world had stopped being fun. (The one upside? I saved a lot of money.)
I wanted to be healthy. I had a new direction in my career, a new life starting, and I decided this was where it turned.
What actually happened (the honest version)
I wish I could tell you I did it the right way from day one. I didn’t.
When I first started losing weight, I developed gastric ulcers. They dropped weight off me fast too fast. It wasn’t healthy and I knew it. I also knew I couldn’t maintain it that way. So I got my stomach healed, got myself back on track, and then I had to figure out what sustainable actually looked like.
Here’s what I want you to know: I am not a gym person. I don’t do yoga. I don’t do Orangetheory. I don’t do anything trendy out there. I’m a fast walker and I like to walk fast. That’s it.
I was active as a nurse on my feet, traveling, moving through my days. I watched what I ate. I didn’t weigh my food or count every calorie. I just paid attention.
That carried me through the 2010s. I got down to around 160, felt good, felt like myself again. Then in 2017 I changed careers, changed jobs, moved to Kansas City. Big life change, a little depression creeping in at the start. I stabilized. I met my husband. And like a lot of women will tell you, I got comfortable. The weight crept back. Never to 320. But up into the mid‑180s.
The GLP-1 chapter
In 2024, the med spa I was working at started carrying semaglutide. I decided to try it myself.
I went from about 180 down to around 140. And I’m going to tell you the truth about what it did for me, because this is the part nobody says out loud:
The medication didn’t make me thin. It helped me finally learn how to eat.
I’m from a generation where a lot of us grew up being told to clean our plates. Some of us grew up not knowing where the next meal was coming from. Food was complicated before any of us ever stepped on a scale.
What the GLP‑1 did was quiet the noise long enough for me to actually hear what my body was telling me when I was full, when I was hungry, when I was bored, when I was stressed.
I learned I didn’t have to deprive myself of the things I love. I just had to learn moderation.
I’m a Nothing Bundt Cake girl. There was a time I could finish one before I left the parking lot. Now I buy one, put it in my refrigerator, and it sits there for three or four days. I take a bite here, a bite there, and I’m satisfied.
I can go out for my favorite ribeye, eat two bites, and be done. Two bites. Satisfied. If I deprive myself, I fail. If I give myself permission and stay honest, I don’t.
2012 — holding up a pair of my old jeans. This was a turning point, not the ending. I’d gain some back, and that’s okay. Progress isn’t linear.
The piece nobody talks about hormones
Here’s what I didn’t understand until I went through it myself: you cannot out‑work disrupted hormones.
You can be disciplined. You can eat clean. You can walk every day. And if your hormones are off especially in your 40s and 50s, especially once you’re peri‑ or post‑menopausal your body may still hold onto weight, your sleep may still be wrecked, your energy may still be flat, and you may still wonder what’s wrong with you.
Nothing is “wrong” with you. Your body is changing, and nobody taught us what to do about it.
I am post‑menopausal. I’m on bioidentical hormone replacement therapy (BHRT), and getting my hormones dialed in has been as important to maintaining my weight and my energy as anything else I’ve done. My mood is steadier. My sleep is real sleep. My body composition is where I want it. I can recover from a long day. I can actually feel like myself.
If you’re a woman in your 40s, 50s, or beyond and you’re working hard and the weight won’t move, we look at your hormones as part of the picture. For many women, that is the foundation.
574 days
As of today, I have maintained my weight around 144–145 pounds for 574 days off any weight‑loss medication. I am still counting. I remind myself every morning.
Here’s how I hold the line:
- I weigh myself every morning. My scale sends the number to my phone.
- I give myself a five‑pound window up or down. Anything outside that window is a red flag and I adjust.
- I write down what I eat. Not obsessively. Just honestly.
- I still have that size 26 pair of blue jeans hanging in my closet. I see them every time I get dressed. I am never going back.
I’m not going to promise you I’ll maintain 145 for the rest of my life. I’m a real person. But I am going to tell you I am never going back to 320. Never.
What confidence actually looks like now
People expect me to say my confidence came from the number on the scale. It didn’t.
My confidence came from learning that the only person who can make me happy is me. Everybody else adds to it my husband, my kids, my grandbabies, my patients but the happiness starts inside me. I learned that the hard way, through a bad marriage, through the weight, through rebuilding.
Now I’m living my life. I have three grown children, their families, grandkids I want to be around for. My husband and I golf. We’re active. We have a good life.
I’m a size 6 and honestly, I still reach for larges and extra‑larges out of habit, because size is just a number stitched into fabric. What matters is what I see in the mirror and how I feel in my clothes.
It helps when my husband gives me a wink or a whistle. I won’t pretend that doesn’t matter. But it’s a bonus. It’s not the reason.
Why I do this work and what it means for you
I’m a businesswoman. I’m not going to pretend I’m not. This is my career and I run ÉLEVÉ to make a living. But that isn’t why I got into weight‑loss medicine.
I got into it because I’ve been the woman sitting in your chair. I know what it feels like to be 320 pounds and not know how you got there. I know the shame, the plate‑cleaning guilt, the food noise, the “I’ll start Monday.” I know what it feels like to look at yourself and not recognize who’s looking back.
I also know what it feels like on the other side. I know what 574 days of maintenance feels like. I know what it’s like to eat two bites of a ribeye and mean it.
So when you come see me:
- GLP‑1 is a tool, not the whole plan. It can help quiet the food noise. It will not, by itself, teach you how to eat. That’s the work and I’ll walk it with you.
- Hormones matter, especially in midlife. If you’re in your 40s or 50s and something feels off, we look at your overall health and labs and talk about options like BHRT when appropriate.
- I will hold you accountable. I want to know what you’re eating. What you’re drinking. Whether you’re moving. Whether you’re sleeping. Your lifestyle and your habits shape your results, not just the medication.
- I will not ask you to be perfect. I’ll ask you to be honest—with me, and with yourself.
- I don’t do one‑size‑fits‑all. Your plan looks like your life, not someone else’s before‑and‑after.
- I’m not going to promise you a number. I’m going to promise you a plan, a partner, and the truth.
Here’s the honest bottom line: I can’t guarantee your results. No one can. But with medical support, the right tools, and a plan you can actually live with, change is absolutely possible.
I don’t want you to feel like you’re failing at this. You’re not. You may just need help. That’s why I’m here. That’s why I built ÉLEVÉ. If you’re tired of starting Monday and ready to actually start, come see me.
I’ve been where you are. I know the way out. Let’s walk it together.
Me today — 54, 145 pounds, 574 days maintained, and ready to walk this with you.
— Kelli 💜
APRN, FNP-BC | Founder and Master Injector | ÉLEVÉ Regenerative Aesthetics & Wellbeing
Serving Lenexa, Overland Park, and the greater Kansas City metro
Private studio inside Image Studios — 8801 Penrose Ln, Suite 106, Lenexa, KS 66219