This Indianapolis woman once weighed 300 pounds. Now she's a champion bodybuilder.

Rachael Heffner waited until she was 27 years old to first wear a bikini in public.

Growing up on the west side of Indianapolis, Heffner said she was “chubby.” By 19, she weighed 300 pounds. She didn’t think she’d live to see 25.

“It was just negativity all the time,” she said.

In August — now two years older than she ever thought she’d be — Heffner stepped on stage at the Indiana Championship Bodybuilding competition in her glittery two-piece and high heels.

Paying it forward:Indiana Chick-fil-A owner will pay employees who volunteer when store temporarily closes
Recovering memories:Five years after picture-less wedding, photographer gives couple a beautiful gift

It was the first time she didn't shy away from attention, but she wasn't nervous. It felt right, like where she was always meant to be.

She walked away with five first-place trophies and a state title.

Talking to Heffner now at the Indianapolis gym she manages she says she’s a different person, and that she hasn’t been that negative person in a long time.

She watches herself in the mirror as she lifts a large weighted plate above her head, then brings it slowly down in front of her chest and holds it there. Then it goes back above her head.

Written above the mirror are the words, "Actions speak louder than words."

When she looks in the mirror now Heffner is proud. The muscles are new. So is the attention, the tan, even her bellybutton. She feels like she's in the right body. For years, she avoided her reflection.

Heffner may say she's a different person, but it isn’t difficult to see how the woman pushing herself to lift the plate again and again is the same woman who bought herself a pair of tennis shoes and slowly started walking on a treadmill in the basement of her Ball State University dorm.

At first just moving was the challenge, or cutting down to one soda per day. Then it was finding healthy options in the dorm dining halls and starting to lift weights after taking a physical conditioning class. Seven months ago, it was deciding to get down to 11 percent body fat to compete.

There’s always a new challenge. And while Heffner’s weight and outlook may have changed, her tenacity and dedication were always there.

Growing up with grief 

Both of Heffner’s parents were police officers, which she said kept them busy and left her to eat whatever was around the house. But the weight really piled on with grief.

Her mom, Kim, was diagnosed with systemic mastocytosis, a rare disease that develops rapidly and is often associated with organ damage, according to Mayo Clinic. They were best friends, Heffner said. They would go fishing in the pond across the street, or cook and bake together.

“I was the baby so I was definitely the favorite, and my sister and brother will attest,” she said. “We did pretty much everything together.”

Kim died in 1998, when Heffner was 7. She knew little about nutrition and, on top of that, she was grieving. So she turned to food.

By the time she started her freshman year at Ball State in 2010, Heffner was uncomfortable and unhappy. She wasn’t getting along with her roommate, a friend from Speedway Senior High School. It fueled her insecurity.

“I knew that that's not necessarily society’s view of beautiful, but it was more of an internal sense of insecurity,” she said. “I didn't care that I didn’t get dates. It was more of, I couldn't look my own self in the mirror.”

When she went home for winter break, something clicked.

“I was like, you know, I’m tired of feeling this way about myself and about my life,” she said.

She bought a pair of running shoes, got a new roommate, threw out all the junk food in her dorm and set a goal: 139 pounds, less than half her current weight.

'I'm going to prove you wrong.'

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” said her dad, Chris.

It wasn’t the first time he’d heard Heffner say she was going to lose the weight. But Heffner said hearing this bothered her, in a good way.

“I was like, ‘OK, I’m going to prove you wrong,’” she said. “And so I did. … I hate being underestimated, and I feel like I have been for a long time, so that was always a driving force.”

That’s not to say her dad wasn’t her biggest supporter. When she came home about a month later for Valentine’s Day, down nearly 20 pounds, he bought her granola bars and a Jillian Michaels DVD instead of chocolates.

Back then Heffner never considered bodybuilding. It wasn’t until graduating in 2014 that she became serious about weightlifting.

Three years later and 140 pounds down, she made international headlines when she told The Daily Mail she turned down a former high school crush who once rejected her because of her weight.

“He apologized for what he said when we were younger,” she told The Daily Mail. “But I’m glad he rejected me, I actually thanked him for it, as he was the reason I was able to get to the size I am today and there’s no point holding grudges.”

She then set her sights on raising and saving $16,000 for surgery to remove excess skin. She posted a video on Facebook showing her picking up her sagging stomach skin and pull it up to her chest.

"It’s a small price to pay for something that makes me so happy, that I’ve worked a long time for," she said. "I’d put it the same as getting a degree."

A few months later, she met trainer and bodybuilder Adam Cayce, who offered her a job as his personal assistant. She left her job at a marketing firm and ended up managing Arc Fitness in the Bates-Hendricks neighborhood of Indianapolis.

They worked hard to strengthen her core before surgery, knowing how difficult it is to recover from abdominal reconstruction.

When Heffner hit 140 pounds, she could squat 255 pounds — nearly as much as she used to weight. 

She hit 130 pounds in October 2017, the week before her surgery. 

Becoming an athlete

Two weeks into her recovery from that surgery, after stubbornly insisting on going to Cayce’s competition, Heffner decided to become a bodybuilder. Cayce never doubted she could do it.

“I wanted to be an athlete and wanted people to look at me and be inspired to do something, whether it be lift weights or play soccer or whatever,” she said. “I wanted people to look at me and say, ‘Well, if she can do it I can do it.’”

She was back on the treadmill within a few weeks and lifting weights in about three months.

For the next eight months her life was carefully portioned and scheduled meals, cardio and an hour or more of weight training every day.

Until the night she won her first competition, when she rewarded herself with a bacon cheeseburger and fries.

"Sunday morning I was right back up on my meal plan," she said. "My body craved healthy food. I was like, 'Oh avocado, I missed you. You are green, and you are wonderful.'"

A week later she practiced her poses in the mirror with Cayce, twisting her legs or wrists to carefully show each muscle. Drop your shoulder, Cayce instructed, followed by an enthusiastic, "Yes!" when she found the right spot.

In bodybuilding, Heffner gained a family of support. Her clients and other gym members ask to take photos with her holding her trophies. They all offer congratulations and compliments. She and Cayce jokingly compete to see who has a more muscular back.

It could be easy for insecurity to creep back, Cayce said, especially when signing up to have judges critique your body. He said the key will be for Heffner to continue to compete with herself, looking for ways to improve her body without worrying about the other 10 women on the stage.

She plans to do just that.

Heffner isn't sure if she will continue in bodybuilding or, if she does, whether she will ever try to take it to a professional level. Her new mantra is that, "Anything is possible."

"I’m living proof of that." she said.

The one thing she is sure of — she's going to live to see 35.

Contact IndyStar reporter Emma Kate Fittes at 317-513-7854 or efittes@gannett.com. Follow her on Facebook and Twitter.