Heroes in a box: Dieting Heroes

Daisy Daily first started thinking about losing weight when she hit her highest weight ever and started having trouble performing her job with the Renton Roads crew in the Department of Transportation. When she noticed her daughter mimicking her own eating habits, she thought that by being a role model for good health she could free her daughter from the
consequences of “carrying an extra load".
First, Daisy visited her doctor to discuss her weight loss options so she could steer clear of the ineffective or unhealthy diets out there. Under doctor supervision, Daisy opted for a low-carb diet. “The first thing I did was spoil myself on steak and seafood,” she laughs. Regular exercise was also an important part of Daisy’s new routine. She started with 20 minutes five times a week on the treadmill and soon was hiking up Mt. Si. She has lost over 100 pounds. She credits Healthy Incentives SM with keeping her on track. The first year she took coaching calls, the second year she did “Colorful Choices” and this year “Get Fit on Route 66,” which is her favorite. “I really liked the e-mail tips,” she said.

Daisy also relies on the Health Matters newsletter for fresh ideas so her efforts to maintain her good health don’t get stale. Daisy has also found support at her worksite from colleagues and her supervisor. She and about 30 of her colleagues
participated in a “poker walk” during Public Health week where they walked around a site and stopped to pick up cards along the way. The person with the best hand at the end got a gift certificate to Subway and everyone got a pedometer.

“They’ve given me a lot of praise through this whole process. They’ve been right there beside me the whole time routing me on, saying ‘Come on, you can do it.’”

For Daisy, losing weight is about good health and being a positive role model for her daughters. “I don’t think it should matter about your shape or size. It’s about being healthy. I’m a much better role model for my daughters now. My oldest daughter started following in my footsteps and started not making the best choices with her eating habits. Watching me eating better and exercising more and having a healthy lifestyle has made her follow that example. We’re a lot more active and healthy family.”

To other county employees striving to improve their health, Daisy says “You’re worth it. You will live a much better life not being restricted.”

1st Artifact
In my first artifact I found that this was relevant in my theme "dieting heroes" because this woman Daisy is hero of overcoming weight. In her case she wasn't born with any weight problems and it didn't run in her family so her weight issue wasn't hereditary and she became obese by bad eating habits. In this article it explains how Daisy realized she was becoming obese like a lot of america and she wanted to do something about it. Daisy also shows she is a hero by trying to prevent her daughters from following her old bad habits. This shows she actually cares about this issue and doesn't want her daughters to face obesity. Overall this artifact shows that some people facing obesity are aware and want to change also Daisy is a dieting hero who overcame this obstacle without being born with hereditary problems.


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2nd Artifact
My next artifact is from the film super size me in which one movie director explores Americans obesity problems and the source of the issue. This video is significant to my theme because it shows how American really is having an obesity problem and some people are not aware and just don't care. From this video I learned that it is almost worst to not have an hereditary problem with weight because in cases like in the video your doing it to yourself through fast food. Children are almost just brought into a world where its normal to eat food everyday for breakfast, lunch and dinner , like mcdonalds. So that being the case it may start to seem normal for being to gorge on the unhealthy food everyday and over time it may become more and more normal to be overweight. Concluding this video I would have to say so far between this artifact and the first, the main similarities are people who are overweight and aware of finding a way to overcome obesity. And also people who are growing up on unhealthy food and unaware of health problems they may be facing themselves.









Jared Fogle
AKA Jared S. Fogle
Born: 1-Dec-1977Birthplace: Indianapolis, IN
Gender: MaleRace or Ethnicity: WhiteSexual orientation: StraightOccupation: Meme

The picture above goes with the article below, the picture shows Jared with his old pants now he is a thin man spreading his words of wisdom on overcoming obesity and eating right.



Nationality: United StatesExecutive summary: Lost 245 lbs eating only fast food
Jared Fogle's story is bizarre but all-American, and all true. He developed a weight problem in adolescence, and as a young man he wore pants with 60-inch waistlines and weighed 425 pounds. His father is a physician, so he often heard about the unhealthy risks of his morbid obesity. "Dead by 40" was his father's sad prognosis. Fogle had tried all the popular weight-loss programs, and failed.
He was attending Indiana University, living in an apartment building with a Subway sandwich shop at the front door, and he ate lunch and dinner there almost daily. Usually he had a steak sandwich, or two, with extra cheese. When the chain adopted its "7 for 6" ad campaign -- seven sandwiches, each with less than six grams of fat -- Fogle decided it would be easy to make their ad campaign his 'diet'.
The Jared Fogle diet: Coffee for breakfast. For lunch, a six-inch turkey sub with a small bag of Baked Lay's chips and a Diet Coke. For dinner, a foot-long veggie sub and a Diet Coke. On the sandwiches, no cheese, no mayonnaise, but plenty of lettuce, green peppers, banana peppers and pickles, and a dab of mustard. No snacks, and no cheating. Exercise was not part of Fogle's plan, but after a few months he noticed he had more energy, and started walking to class. Toward the end of his diet was walking about a mile and a half daily.
After about 700 sub sandwiches in a little less than a year, he had lost 245 pounds. As classmates complimented him on his new look, he became the focus of an article in the campus newspaper, and someone -- was it Fogle? -- sent the clipping to Subway's headquarters.
Of course, everyone in the fast food industry knows -- or "knew" -- that customers were not interested in healthy food, so Subway's national office saw Fogle as an oddity, not an opportunity. The company's marketing staff had not even been responsible for the "7 for 6" ad campaign -- those ads were created by a local franchise operator in Houston, and the chain only took the campaign national after sales at that Houston franchise jumped noticeably. Similarly, it was only after a Chicago franchisee read about Fogle's weight loss in Men's Health magazine, and created a local ad that dramatically increased that store's sales, that Subway hired Fogle for his first national ads in 2000. When the commercials began running, sales jumped by about 20% almost immediately. After a few years of "Jared the Subway Guy" commercials, Subway's research showed that audiences were growing weary of Fogle, and they began phasing him out of their ads. Sales went down, and Fogle came back.
What is the Fogle allure? He is not as handsome as most celebrity spokesmen, and he could stand to lose a few more pounds, but he is for real. It is easy to make jokes about his commercials, but impossible to be cynical after meeting him. He knows his time in the spotlight will come to an end eventually, but he is also sure he will never be fat again.
He graduated from college, snagged a girlfriend who became his wife, and he is the author of Jared, the Subway Guy: Winning Through Losing: 13 Lessons for Turning Your Life Around. He frequently jets around the country, representing Subway as the chain opens new sandwich shops, or making personal appearances as a motivational speaker. He still eats at Subway several times a week, but not daily. He watches his calories, still drinks diet soda, and a regular walking regimen helps keep him cuddly if not quite thin.



3rd Artifact
My 3rd artifact is very relevant to this theme because it Jared Fogle is a true american dieting hero. This article depicts the story of Jared and his struggles. Jared fits in the category of having a hereditary case of obesity. Even though he tried many, many dieting programs and failed he still didn't give up on his dream of being a thin man. By college he was still facing this problem but then he started eating subway everyday and stuck to a diet right for him and overcame this huge problem that he thought would plaque him his whole life. Jared showed his perseverance and unwillingness to not be part of the big percent of American's facing this problem. By being a spokesperson of subway his message of eating right might of help tons of people facing obesity and even if some lost weight just from hearing about Jared and that is pretty amazing. I learned some people can over come obesity if they just become aware of their problem.



Obesity in a "Fattist" Society: Not an Eating Disorder

Obesity is not an eating disorder. It is not even a psychological disorder. But it is often mistaken for both, which is why we have something to say about it here.

What is it?
Obesity is a physical condition. Technically speaking, you are defined as being obese when you have significantly more body fat than is considered safe for your physical health. Because body fat is difficult to measure precisely, in practice the measure commonly used instead is your weight in pounds, which is referenced against a set of weight standards based on a your gender, height and body type. If you were to weigh 20% above the expected weight for a person of your gender, height and body type, you would be considered obese.

How does a person become obese?
According to various studies, more than one-half of American adults are overweight, and about half of those (or one in four Americans) could be considered obese. Yet much of American society is extremely prejudiced against very overweight individuals. Think about your own attitude when you see someone very overweight: do you guess that they must be gluttonous and lazy? Many people assume that you "did this" to yourself, and that you can lose weight if only you would put your mind to it and exert some self-control. In fact, that's not quite how it goes. There is no single understood cause of obesity, but data shows that genetic predisposition, environmental factors, and behavior are the most common causes. Certain medical conditions or medical treatments can also result in obesity. Obesity is found to be more common among those of lower socioeconomic status, and among certain minority populations. The reason for these last associations is multi-determined (e.g., genetic factors; less access to costly "whole foods" and produce), but the link often unfairly reinforces certain stereotypes held about people of color and those with fewer economic resources.

Psychological factors
You may become very overweight because of psychological or emotional factors. Excessive overeating or becoming obese may be ways of coping with other personal problems. You may, for instance, use food for a purpose it cannot fulfill (e.g., love, comfort, escape), and thereby end up very overweight. You also may find social or interpersonal situations so difficult in some regard, that you separate and protect yourself from these encounters through your obesity. Or you may have such negative feelings about yourself that you abuse your health by overeating, and your negative self-image becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

One in four?
It is difficult to see here at Brown how, on average, one in four adult Americans is obese. For a variety of reasons (including socioeconomic status ), obesity is much less apparent at Brown than in the general US population. Many societal factors may be at play in limiting the number of obese individuals visible on this and other campuses. For instance, obese people may find ways to avoid being seen. Very overweight people can also be discriminated against in school, in work, in social activities and in interpersonal relationships.

Emotional suffering
Think about the student culture in your high school and now in college. Think about the importance to you of your physical appearance, how much you care about the acceptance and approval of your peers, and think about how much you want to make a good impression and be found appealing to everyone (whether it be a romantic interest, or the boss at your internship, where you hope to stand out favorably). Now think about how well you do, or would do, in these situations as an obese person.… Being very overweight can be emotionally excruciating for a young adult.

What health problems are associated with obesity?
When you are markedly overweight, there is a greater likelihood you will have hypertension (high blood pressure), which is associated with serious health problems and premature death. There are also links to diabetes, coronary heart disease, and breathing problems.

What you can do?
If you are concerned about obesity, you can do something about it. If you need to lose weight for the sake of your health, or you want to lose weight for the sake of your self-esteem, medical providers and the nutritionist at Health Services can work with you to develop a realistic plan for weight loss. It will likely be a long, slow, but steady process, which will involve changing your diet as well as increasing your physical activity level. Friends, family, or peers in similar situations may be very helpful to you in maintaining your motivation. An individual counselor may be particularly helpful to you as well--as a support and as someone with whom you can learn new habits and develop new confidence. When psychological factors contribute to a person's becoming very overweight in the first place, a professional counselor or psychotherapist may be very helpful in exploring the roots of the problem and finding new ways to cope. Most importantly, you should be gentle with yourself. Losing weight in a healthy manner is hard work and it is normal to have setbacks.

4th Artifact
In my final artifact I learned that true reasons behind what causes obesity and how many different problems go into. I found that obesity isn't a eating disorder but can be categorized as an effect of overeating. In obesity some people have more problems then just want to eat, there is a lot more that goes into than that. People can become overweight in a number ways, in the article it stated people may sometimes have medical treatments that make them have an overactive appetite. Also it said obesity is more common in the lower socioeconomic status for being trying to fill what they don't have. Some have hereditary problems and some have physiological problems that make them eat they way they are. As I read into the article above it gave facts that said some people eat to cope with things or use it for a purpose they cannot fulfill. I also learned it can lead to emotional suffering and is that where American is heading with so many people being overweight, after all we are the most overweight in the world right? Being obese also have more health problems and it leads to a shorter life time. Overall this was relevant because it shows there can be many reasons that person may become overweight and how it effects them emotionally and physically.





Conclusion:
Overall after studying all my artifacts I will conclude to say that I found In my dieting heros theme of people either having hereditary problems or just poor dieting they are aware or unaware. But, as I made this my theme things got more complicated as more factors of how a person gets to being obese or how they are obese from the start of their life. Anyways I found that whether you are born with a hereditary case or not you can still overcome this national problem. That is unless you are using eating as way to fulfill something you don't have or to comfort yourself. In that case you have to become aware and want to change because if you are person okay with poor dieting you will not change if you keep your habits. So being a dieting hero takes determination, willingness and the want to change yourself. From my first artifact I took away that Daisy being aware of her bad habit she could put them to a stop so her daughters wouldn't make poor decisions either. In the super size me video it showed how americans may be just eating mcdonalds and being unaware of how bad it really it is for them. That or they just don't care. Next in the artifacts is Jared Fogle and is story in pioneering as one the greatest dieting heros. From his article I gathered that if you are persistent in your goal to being thin then it can happen. Then in my last artifact I took away that sometimes people have no control of what they feel emotional and can eat to fulfill things they don't have so therefore they are unaware. Overall I conclude that if faced with obesity hereditary or not you can overcome it by being determined, willing and aware of what and how you are eating.