The Story Behind STILL
In 2012, I was driving home from Lexington, Kentucky, with absolutely no idea what I was going to do with my life.
I had gone into internal medicine thinking I would eventually pursue pulmonary/critical care. But a couple of years into my training at the University of Kentucky, my mom was diagnosed with stage IV breast cancer. I made the easiest decision to stop residency and move home to Mississippi to be with her.
The truth was, I already knew internal medicine wasn't the right path for me. My mom's illness simply gave me a reason to stop long enough to admit it. On the drive home, a friend asked me what I was going to do next. I didn't have an answer. So I said, almost offhandedly, “Honestly, all I really want to do is Botox.” He looked at me and said, “Well, how do you do that?” “I have no idea.” So somewhere between Lexington and Mississippi, we started figuring it out.
Within a week, I was researching training and what it would take to start a practice. I learned to inject and eventually rented a single room inside an aesthetician's office. I had a handful of patients. I answered my own phone, scheduled every appointment, ordered every supply and did every treatment myself.
It was small. But I loved it.
Finding the Creative Side of Medicine
Looking back, it makes perfect sense that I found my way into aesthetics.
I've always been deeply creative. But growing up, I intentionally chose the other side of myself. I gravitated toward math and science, went to medical school and became a physician. Aesthetics was one of the first places where those two parts of me came together. It required anatomy, science and precision, but there was artistry to it, too. Every face was different. Every person moved differently. And a few millimeters or a subtle change in dose could completely change a result.
At the same time, I was already interested in integrative and functional medicine and had trained with Dr. Andrew Weil at the University of Arizona. My first practice grew into a combination of functional medicine and nonsurgical aesthetics—hormonal health, gut health, micronutrients and injectables. Some of that was influenced by my mom. I incorporated IV micronutrient therapy in part because I wanted a place where she could receive high-dose vitamin C as part of the care she was pursuing.
She got to see that first little practice grow. Eventually, I returned to residency, but this time in emergency medicine, and became board-certified. But through residency and the years that followed, I kept my aesthetics practice.
It was always the work I came back to.
There Had to Be a Simpler Way
I've now had the unusual experience of watching the nonsurgical aesthetics industry grow up around me.
When I started injecting, there were far fewer products and choices. Over time, aesthetic medicine became more sophisticated. So did patients' expectations. The goal moved away from the obviously “frozen” look toward something much more nuanced: rested, relaxed and still recognizably you.
But as the industry evolved, something else happened. It became incredibly confusing. I would sit with patients explaining units, products, conversion ratios and dosing—and watch their eyes glaze over. They didn't really care about the math.
They wanted to know two things:
What am I going to look like, and what is this going to cost?
And yet the traditional model often starts in exactly the opposite place. A patient chooses how many units she wants to purchase, often based on what she wants to spend. That number then determines the treatment she receives and, ultimately, can determine her result. After years of having the same conversation, I kept thinking: Why are we making this so complicated? Patients shouldn't have to become experts in neurotoxin to receive excellent treatment. That's our job.
We shouldn't start with how much Botox you want to buy. We should start with how you want to look.
That idea became the foundation for STILL.
Building Something Different
I didn't want to open another traditional medical practice. And I didn't want to create another med spa with an enormous menu of treatments. I wanted to do one thing exceptionally well.
STILL is a physician-led studio focused on neurotoxin, with an experience designed to remove as much of the confusion as possible. We assess the face, understand the desired outcome, map the treatment and determine the appropriate dosing. Pricing is transparent from the beginning, and follow-up is part of the experience.
You don't need to know how many units you need. You don't need to understand conversion ratios. And you don't need to walk in knowing exactly what to ask for. You just need to tell us how you want to look.
I wanted the physical space to feel different, too. Not quite a doctor's office. Definitely not a traditional med spa. Elevated but comfortable. Beautiful without being intimidating. Great music. No pressure to buy another product or add another procedure.
And efficient. Come in. Let us take care of you. Then go live your life. Even the name came surprisingly easily.
STILL.
There's the obvious connection to neurotoxin and movement. But over time, the word has come to mean something more to me. Because the goal was never to make someone look like somebody else. You're still you.
Why I'm Building It
There is another part of the STILL story that has taken me longer to articulate.
I've spent a lot of my life hearing reasons I couldn't do something. That I wasn't bright enough. I didn't have enough experience. I didn't know enough about business. And sometimes, directly or indirectly, that certain things simply weren't what women did. I've watched women I love encounter versions of that same message.
My mother did, too.
She didn't escape all of it. But she gave me something incredibly important: the desire to choose for myself. For a long time, I think some part of me wanted to prove that I could. I don't anymore. I'm much more interested in seeing what happens when I trust that I can.
That's part of why I'm building STILL now. I want to create something that is bigger than a practice with my name on the door. I want to build a company, take the risk and see where the idea can go. And now I have a daughter watching me do it.
I don't need her to become a physician. I don't need her to start a company. Success can look a thousand different ways, and I want her to decide for herself what it looks like for her. But I do want her to have a story in her life about a woman who had an idea, trusted herself enough to pursue it and built something she believed in. Maybe, in its own small way, that's connected to what we do at STILL.
I don't believe a woman needs Botox to be confident. And I certainly don't believe looking younger determines her value. But I do believe women are allowed to care about how they feel when they look in the mirror. I've seen what happens when a woman feels good walking into a room. She might stand a little taller. Speak a little more confidently. Or simply spend a little less time thinking about the thing that was bothering her.
If thoughtful, beautifully done aesthetics can give someone a little more of that feeling, I'm proud to be part of it. Because STILL isn't really about changing someone's face. It's about giving her the freedom to walk back into her life feeling like herself.
Still her. Still you.