Keli Richards was born in Norwood, MA, and grew up in Dedham, MA. of Irish and Italian descent, she was the youngest in a family of eight children (she has four brothers and three sisters). Her s father was a World War II veteran and a police officer who committed suicide when she was 11 and was raised by her very strict mother. She ran track in high school, but dropped out of high school in the tenth grade and got a job as a waitress.