hi all.. I am actually a person of color with an eating disorder. I think the reason she asked this question (but feel free to respond) is because there is this stereotype that certain minorities do not care about being "skinny." There may be a stereotype that we eat fattening foods and in the culture it is not as strongly pushed to be "skinny" as in other cultures. Taking on that stereotype or belief, it feels TWICE as shaming to have an eating disorder when you ARENT supposed to.

With all that said, I think her question was more expressing shame at having a disorder when culturally it is not expected. Many books on eating disorders and counseling have noted the cultural differences of people and their receptiveness to going to counseling, recognizing disordered behavior, and approaches to dealing with it.

What I would say to all that is that culture does affect us strongly. We are people first though. Every person has imprints of their culture AND their past on them. Our thoughts and behaviors are manifestations of both and sometimes it leads to disorders.

Regardless of what people say we should do or be or how we should behave, life has dealt us another set of cards. Denial and increased shame at our issues doesn't help, but working towards healing does. It may be a stigma to be a person of color with an eating disorder now. (I have experienced it) but shame is underlying all stigmas. Shame is underlying my eating disorder, so I chose not to accept it. I chose to accept myself and work on me

Hope that helps!