Obesity Advocacy: Your Voice Matters Whenever You Speak Up
At the dawn of the second day of YWM2025 yesterday, a panel of people sharing diverse advocacy experiences began the day. Tracy Zvenyach, the Obesity Action Coalition (OAC) Director of Policy, chaired the session. Abrianna Wolfgram, Laura Gomez, Liz Paul, and Sarah Bramblette made the panel complete. Each of them had a unique story to tell. Even so, a single message was loud and clear. Your voice and your experience of living with obesity matters whenever you speak up.
Just about everyone has loved ones who live with obesity. But you would be surprised how often people have no clue of the effect it has on the lives of others.
Speaking Up For Access to Care at Work
Laura Gomez described her experience speaking up for access to care through her health plan at work as a teacher. For the sake of her health, she needed metabolic (bariatric) surgery, but shockingly her school system excluded it from their health plan. Heart bypass? Sure. Gastric bypass? Nope.
So, working with OAC’s lobbyist, Chris Gallagher, Gomez made presentations to her school system two consecutive times. She praised Gallagher for arming her with a confident strategy to persist and prevail after they turned her down the first time. To succeed, she focused on the system’s goals with Gallagher’s help and support.
She told them: “For you, this is just a meeting and a vote. For me, it is my whole life at stake.” They approved the change in benefits and her surgery has been life changing. More important, the change is benefitting people who came after her.
Taking to the Hill
Liz Paul described how she was reluctantly drawn into advocacy for the OAC, which ultimately led her to join the board of directors. She is a natural, simply telling her story and leading others to tell their stories on the Hill to policymakers this week
Abrianna Wolfgram described her experience as a youth in the OAC Thrive Together program for youth and families. Sharing her personal experiences was new for her and Capitol Hill was intimidating. She was not comfortable with politics. But it turned out that the experience was not political at all. It was about life. People listened respectfully, taking notes the whole time. Actually quite validating.
Three Simple Rules
Sara Bramblette, OAC’s Senior Advocacy Manager, has made a career out of something that started as a simple matter of sticking up for herself. She offers three basic rules that we can all live by.
IF you don’t go after what you want, you will never get it.
IF you don’t ask, the answer will always be no.
And IF you don’t step forward, you will always be in the same place.
So, go, ask, and step forward. Your voice matters more than you will ever know.
Click here for more on getting started with advocacy through OAC.
A New Day at YWM2025, photograph by Ted Kyle / ConscienHealth
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July 27, 2025
July 27, 2025 at 9:24 am, Allen Browne said:
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