As any dieter knows, reaching a goal weight isn’t the tough part — staying there is. Which is why Kirstie Alley has good reason to celebrate this summer: July marks a full eight months since the 5-foot-7 star first hit her dream digit, 144 lbs. And Kirstie, 56 — who recently filmed a pilot for Fox, The Minister of Divine — has every intention of keeping that number on the scale. “She looks great, and I know she is feeling like her old self again, with a lot more energy,” her longtime friend actress Kelly Preston tells Quick & Simple. “She’s always had a sense of humor about her, but now she’s really laughing again.”

A Devastating Blow

Not long ago, Kirstie’s figure was no laughing matter. She went from svelte sitcom darling — weighing as little as 120 lbs. during her run on Cheers — to a 219-lb. high in 2004. She says that being a devoted mother to her adopted children, son William True, now 14, and daughter Lillie Price, now 12, was partially to blame. “I was the ideal mom,” explains Kirstie, who was divorced from actor Parker Stevenson in 1997. “I’d be cooking for them and had to taste everything 50 times.”

The psychological reasons behind her overeating went far deeper: As Kirstie revealed in her autobiography, How to Lose Your Ass and Regain Your Life, she was left emotionally devastated by a miscarriage in 1990. “When the baby was gone, I just didn’t really get over it,” she wrote. “Neither did my body.… That’s when I began to get fat.”

Kirstie’s fame made her transformation anything but private. Tabloid headlines screamed that she was morbidly obese, and she was hounded by paparazzi. “I had a serious, life-threatening phobia of photos being taken,” says Kirstie. She used the unwelcome public scrutiny as comedic fodder, lampooning herself in the Showtime series Fat Actress. But she was far from satisfied with her size, and when weight-loss company Jenny Craig approached her in late 2004 to become its client and spokesperson, she jumped at the opportunity.

A Change for the Better

The changes to her lifestyle were extreme and immediate. “Kirstie was eating 5,000 to 6,000 calories per day,” says her Jenny Craig weight-loss counselor, Tania Azar. “She was an unconscious eater — baking and cooking and just trying everything that she made.”

Kirstie cut back to 1,500 calories a day, eating small, frequent portions consisting of 20 percent to 30 percent protein; 20 percent to 25 percent fat; and around 55 percent carbs. Within the first 10 months, she shed 55 lbs., and when she hit her goal weight a year later, she celebrated memorably by appearing on The Oprah Winfrey Show in a skimpy bikini.

A Permanent Transformation

Now, Kirstie’s challenge is maintaining the trimmer figure she unveiled on national TV. “She’s elated about her weight loss, which keeps her motivated,” says Azar. Another driving force is the journal Kirstie uses to track her daily food intake and sleep and workout schedules — tangible evidence of whether she is on or off course.

These days, instead of baking countless cakes for her family, she plies them with steamed organic chicken, fish and vegetables. “This is probably the first time in my adult life where I’ve had an extended period of sanity in regard to the way I eat,” says Kirstie.

And not to worry: Kirstie has no plan to become another scary-skinny Hollywood celebrity. “Her goal was never to be waif-thin,” says Azar.
“Now she’s focusing on shaping her body. She’d be OK with it if she lost another 10 lbs. in the process, but it’s not about that.” Besides, Kirstie seems to have the right attitude. “I’ll always have to work on my backside, and my legs need to be firmer,” she says. “But I think I have pretty eyes and a nice mouth to offset that.”