7 Famous Black Women Who've Shared Their Body Image Issues
‘Love Your Thighs Day’: 7 Famous Black Women Who’ve Shared Their Struggles With Body Image
Another national holiday has arrived, and it’s all about loving your body. Love Your Thighs Day is a day for women to celebrate figures of all different shapes and sizes. Western societal beauty standards have long made women believe they had to be super thin to be attractive, especially those of African descent. Case in point: Sarah Baartman. These restrictive standards continue to plague many women, including some celebrities.
Let’s take a look at seven famous Black women who have opened up about their issues with body image.
1. Chloe Bailey, 26
Chloe Bailey has been praised for years for her curvy hips and thighs. Anyone looking at her would believe she took great pride in them, and she does. In fact, the singer sometimes gets criticized for showing her legs off too much. Chloe admitted, however, that loving her body was a struggle growing up.
In a 2022 interview with Allure, she said, “It’s complicated. I’ve always had thick thighs and a butt. But I was growing up at a time when, if someone on television told you that you had a big butt, they meant it as an insult. So I was a little ashamed of my curves. I tried to hide them. It took a very, very long time. Now, my favorite thing about [my body] is my butt.”
2. Kerry Washington, 48
Some of Kerry Washington’s most popular roles are of her playing strong women. But during a press run for her memoir, Thicker Than Water, she candidly shared her struggles with body dysmorphia. Washington’s fight to view her body as beautiful was so deep growing up, she even considered suicide.
She told Essence in 2020, “I used food as a way to cope. It was my best friend. I’d eat anything and everything,” she says, “sometimes until I passed out. But then, because I had this personality that was driven toward perfectionism, I would tell people I was at the library, but instead go to the gym and exercise for hours and hours and hours. Keeping my behavior a secret was painful and isolating. There was a lot of guilt and a lot of shame.”
The Scandal actress sought out therapy and a nutritionist, which she says has helped a lot. “Therapy helped me realize that maybe it’s okay for me to communicate my feelings. Instead of literally stuffing them down with food, maybe it’s okay for me to express myself.”
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3. Fantasia, 40
Fantasia also came clean about the struggle to feel beautiful in a 2016 interview with People.
The former American Idol winner said, “I will say, being a ‘real Black woman’ with big lips, wide nose, short hair, a big ol’ booty and hips, and not what they say a Black [celebrity] should be, was kinda hard.”
She added, “But now I’m like, ‘Chocolate is good!’ I accept my big lips—some people are paying for ’em!” she said. “I don’t knock anybody for what they do. But for me, I’m just at that place where I’m good. I’m a woman now. I wouldn’t change a thing.”
4. Tami Roman, 55
Actress and former Basketball Wives star Tami Roman has also suffered from body dysmorphia. Watching her in the reality show created by Shaunie Henderson, Roman always came off as a confident, no-nonsense type of woman. But, in 2023, she told The Breakfast Club hosts that she had internal conflicts with how she saw her body.
“The thing is, I have a condition that’s called body dysmorphia, and I’ve had it since I was 13 years old. It is a mental disorder based on either trauma or genetics, and mine is trauma-based,” she said. “What happens with that is the way I look at myself and the way people see me are two different things. I think about myself as My 600-lb Life. No matter how I look to people, when I look at myself, I can always pick something apart. I always feel like I’m overweight.”
5. Lizzo, 36
Before her recent weight loss transformation, Lizzo was the face of body positivity. She made music to uplift plus-size women and made sure to use plus-size backup dancers. In 2020, the “Good As Hell” singer recalled having an ex-boyfriend who was thin, and he told her, “‘I’m a little guy. I need a little girl.’” As a solution, Lizzo said she attempted to imitate thin white women. She soon realized, “I can’t just wake up and be a white girl.”
She added in the Rolling Stone interview, “I’ve come to terms with body dysmorphia and evolved. The body-positive movement is doing the same thing. We’re growing together, and it’s growing pains, but I’m just glad that I’m attached to something so organic and alive.”
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6. Brandy Norwood, 46
Brandy Norwood had fame as a teenage singer and actress starring in her own sitcom, Moesha. But during the ’90s, Brandy suffered from eating disorders.
She told Behind the Music in 2012, “I wanted to be so thin. That was my main thing. So I started not taking care of myself—not eating properly, not eating at all, diet pills, regurgitating, and all of these things that girls do. People don’t understand that being the hottest star or making the most money does not mean anything,” she shared. “I’m here to tell you I was making so much money—I was omnipresent—and I was the unhappiest teenager probably in the world.”
7. Beverly Johnson, 72
Like so many other entertainment industries, the modeling world is brutal when it comes to image. It’s long been a requirement for women to have tall and thin bodies to advance in the competitive career path. With that in mind, it was hard for Black women and plus-size women to get a shot in the field. Many models suffered from bulimia and even ate cotton balls to make themselves feel full so they wouldn’t eat.
Retired supermodel Beverly Johnson opened up about going as far as doing cocaine to stay thin.
She told Page Six in 2024, “We were led to believe that cocaine was not addictive. We didn’t know cocaine was addictive. Everyone used drugs back in the day but that particular drug for models was used because we did not eat.” She recalled, “I remember eating two eggs and a bowl of brown rice a week. I would be shaking in a cab, and I would say pull over because I have to get a bag of M&Ms. We did not eat, and every time you came to work they would say, ‘Yes! Chisel to the bone girl. Yes,’ like congratulating you. Nobody really told you the truth.”
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