It’s all the buzz in the entertainment news when a celebrity appears with a dramatic weight loss. Three particular stories of high-profile celebrity weight loss offer valuable lessons to consider.
I’ve always liked the actor John Goodman, from memorable movie appearances in several Coen Brothers films to Dan Connor on Roseanne. He’s always been “the big guy” and his weight contributed to getting him out of the Vietnam draft so we know it’s been a lifelong issue for him. An online bio mentions in passing that a doctor ordered him to lose weight in 2005 but it wasn’t until 2010 that John made a splash with a significant weight loss.
John wouldn’t actually provide any details how he lost the weight but on the David Letterman Show he said that after reaching nearly 400 lbs, managing his weight would be “…an ongoing process for the rest of my life.”
I’ve seen John Goodman in commercials for a new film and he looks like his old self to me. I’d estimate his weight loss back in 2010 was probably as much as half his body weight but it looks like he’s gained all or most of it back in just a couple of years. For whatever reasons, the “ongoing process” did not happen.
Jonah Hill made a name for himself in his early twenties playing the hapless but lovable and appealing chubby guy. We can assume from his age that he’s probably been overweight since childhood. To play a cop in 21 Jump Street, Jonah made headlines with a dramatic weight loss. But by the time he was making promotional appearances for the movie, he was already gaining the weight back. The loss was very short-lived. Jonah Hill looks just the same today as he did before. Like John Goodman, the details of Jonah’s loss weren’t made part of the publicity.
Political activist Rev. Al Sharpton once weighed 300 lbs but today looks downright tiny. He credits a vegetarian diet and vigorous daily exercise. His regimen was profiled in a full-page article in the Wall Street Journal. When Pres. Obama suggested Rev. Al should “let loose” for Thanksgiving, Rev. Al was resolute, ”I will not break my diet even with a presidential pardon.”
When asked to elaborate on that celebratory Thanksgiving meal, Rev. Al likened over-indulgence with recklessness, “You should not celebrate being reckless. You are with your family, the people you love, so why celebrate in a way that could take you away from them. Celebrate in a way that shows you are thankful for another year of life and plan to see another.”
Rev. Al also hopes to be an example for the Black community that suffers higher rates of obesity than other demographics. “You can’t address our issues and demand social justice when you are a prisoner in your own body, and you can’t have a reckless social life when you are looking for social justice.”
These are three interesting stories of high-profile celebrity weight loss to compare. It’s obvious that two of them were temporary diets while one is the profile of a significant life transformation. Dropping a lot of weight with some extreme diet can be exciting but it’s always temporary. It’s also proof that weight management can be so difficult, even achieving a significant loss won’t be enough to help people maintain. John Goodman got one fact right, then unfortunately proved it when he failed to live it himself: Weight management IS a process that has to continue for the rest of your life. To accomplish that, the changes that bring about the weight loss have got to be sustainable.
When you think about what it takes to lose weight, what changes would you make that you believe you could maintain for life?
