Book Review #1 – Not All Black Girls Know How to Eat

Title: Not All Black Girls Know How to Eat

Author: Stephanie Covington Armstrong https://stephaniecovingtonarmstrong.com/about/ (click here to learn more about her and visit her website!) 

Synopsis: In her memoir Not All Black Girls Know How to Eat, Stephanie Covington Armstrong discusses her bulimia, both its causes and impacts, over the expanse of her life. She explains how many conditions of her childhood, including poverty, sexual abuse, abandonment, and food insecurity all informed her mental illness and her experience with food and coping. Although eating disorders are typically (and inaccurately) considered a “white woman’s illness,” Armstrong’s experience powerfully combats that narrative and furthermore looks into how that stereotype impacted her experience with diagnosis, treatment, and recovery. 

Why I liked this book: First of all, memoirs are my favorite genre. Throughout the novel, Armstrong’s voice is casual and relatable, and she provides so much room for the reader to reflect on their own experiences through her story. She bravely opens up a space for many other black women to feel heard within the eating disorder narrative, and also a space for women like me (white or white-passing) to reflect on how much we benefit from a racist mental healthcare system. This book represents eating disorders as a social justice issue rather than just an illness, with various combining factors and circumstances (including racism). The way she relates eating to coping helped me see how that relationship plays out in my own life. Armstrong breaks down ED stereotypes and opens up an important conversation about how harmful said stereotypes can be. This book is deeply sad and moving, but it is also a celebration of strength and resilience!!

Powerful passage: “Twenty-plus years ago the terms eating disorder, bulimia, anorexia, binge eating and compulsive eater had not yet seeped into the popular lexicon, which made it easier to stay in denial. I preferred to think of it simply as ‘my little problem with food.’ Sure I had heard the words anorexic and bulimic, but to me that meant girls like Karen Carpenter” (page 164). 

Things to keep in mind: This book includes extremely detailed descriptions of binging and purging, as well as mentions of certain weight numbers, height numbers, and calories. This memoir may be triggering for individuals who do not feel they can read the details of an eating disorder. This book also details sexual assault and abuse.

Link: https://www.kizzysbooksandmore.com/book/9781556527869  (please try to buy this book from a black-owned bookstore rather than amazon!!)

Related article: https://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/stories-of-hope/digesting-truth-stephanie-covington-armstrong