Perfect Body, Broken Inside: How Jesus Freed Lydia Jacon from Perfectionism, Binge Eating, and Shame | 014

Perfect Body, Broken Inside: How Jesus Freed Lydia Jacon from Binge Eating, Shame & Perfectionism 💔✨

Lydia Jacon had the “perfect” body on stage 💃—but behind closed doors, she battled binge eating 🍽️, shame 😔, and perfectionism that felt impossible to escape.

In this inspiring episode, Lydia shares how Jesus 💖 set her free and gave her life back.

✨ You’ll discover:

• How perfectionism hides behind success and appearance 👀
• The truth about body shame and self-criticism in Christian women 🙏
• Steps to silence the inner critic and embrace God’s grace 🌿

If you’ve struggled with shame, self-doubt, or perfectionism, this story will give you hope 🌟.

🎧 Listen now and remember: Jesus sees you, loves you, and can set you free! 🙌

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💰Show support: The Redeemed Perfectionist | Where Grace Meets Grit: Healing the Perfectionist Heart | Patreon

Transcript

Perfect Body, Broken Inside: How Jesus Freed Lydia Jacon from Perfectionism, Binge Eating, and Shame | 014

Instagram:  lydfitcoaching

Website: lydfitcoaching.com

Email:  lydfitcoaching@gmail.com

Leneé Pezzano Life is. For living, not for dieting all the time.

She had the perfect body on stage, but behind closed doors, Lydia was trapped in binge eating and shame. Today you'll hear how Jesus set her free. Hey, Sis. Welcome to the Redeemed Perfectionist podcast where we expose the many ways perfectionism shows up and keeps us from truly living and where hope is restored for women like you.

I am your host, Leneé Pezzano. Over the next several episodes, we'll dive into the stories of real women who struggled with perfectionism in their bodies, but found freedom through the power of Jesus.  From competitive bodybuilders to everyday women, you'll be inspired by what happens when Jesus takes over, and 

[00:01:00] you might already have someone in mind who could benefit from this series, and be sure to share it with them as well.

And if you haven't listened to our recent series on shame, I encourage you to go back to episodes 12 and 13. They lay such a strong foundation for what we're talking about today. 

[Music]

Lydia, welcome to the Redeemed Perfectionist. Thanks for being a guest today. It's so good to have you. This is such a bit of a sober topic that we're gonna talk about today. So listeners get ready. You might even wanna pull over, get a pen and paper out, download this episode and get ready to re-listen to it 'cause today's conversation's gonna be a hot one.

So wanna welcome today, Lydia. She's just a sweet sister in the Lord who's got quite the story to tell. This is a young woman who prior to Jesus, 

[00:02:00] Lydia, you were a competitor in bikini competitions, correct? 

Correct, yes. Yeah. Yeah.

And had some pretty big achievements with that. 2018 Overall Bikini for the Australian Natural Bodybuilding. And then 2019 crowned Miss Bikini Brisbane in I compete natural. Am I saying that right? Yeah, that's it. Yeah. Yeah. So some really significant achievements and I'm sure a lot of hard work to get there.

However part of why I have you here today is because that journey has, a lot of things attached to it that really didn't point you to life and to what Jesus would have to offer and instead took you down some dark roads. And that's what we wanna talk about today. We wanna talk about that journey where it all began, and then thank God where it has led to today. 

[00:03:00] Let's take a moment and go to your backstory and let's talk about when it all began. You, I don't think, if I remember correctly, you weren't a Christian when you first got started. What made you want to go down this particular road? 

It started when I was in high school.When I started getting obsessed withl ooking a certain way.  I started to gain weight in that higher 11 or 12 year. So yeah, that's when I became concerned with weight. And as every woman usually does, they start out doing a lot of cardio. As I did start to do cardio, I got introduced to lifting weights and that's when I got very intrigued with the idea of bikini bodybuilding. I would watch YouTube videos. There was a lot of bikini competitors doing vlogs that was getting really big and I guess I just wanted to be a part of that. And I found sculpting the body was very rewarding.

[00:04:00] And it looked good. It would feel good, and I just wanted to be one of those people on stage to compete.

Yeah. And I was always a very timid person. I would never be one to say speeches. Everyone who knows me knows that I'm very shy. And I think a lot of people at school were very confused how I could get up on stage in front of. Hundreds of people and be in a bikini. Yeah. But it was something different about being up there.

It was just victorious in a way and very Yeah. Addictive. And to see results was addictive and to know like how, what was going into my body and how I can control it was super cool. I knew how much to eat and what results I could get with it. Yeah. Amazing. Yeah. 

And so before you actually started to go down that road, which would have required a level of drive and discipline 

[00:05:00] back to when you were noticing you were gaining weight as a young woman what was that like when you looked in the mirror, what were the kind of thoughts that went through your head, if you're even aware?

Yeah, I. It came to me today actually, how confused I was because I was always a very thin, I was the skinny kid and hated being the skinny kid. But when I started to gain weight, I had more of an appetite. I never had an appetite when I was a kid. So when I started getting appetite, I, it was just, what is going on?

I thought I was the problem. I remember my mom took me to a dietician when I was very young because I was so confused why I was gaining weight and I was scared it wasn't going to stop, that I would gain so much weight that I would now be the fat kid. I don't know if I'm allowed to say that, but the fat kid.

Yeah. Yeah. So it was weird. It was just, I was really, I was scared. Yeah. Yeah. So I had to find a solution.

[00:06:00]Yeah. Yeah. And I just, I hear that and I think, and I've met others who had the skinny kid syndrome. I was the Fat Kid syndrome, but either way, something so deep in us was so rooted in the belief that our value is based on how we look.

And that's, scripturally even, we know God looks on the heart, but man looks on the outer appearance and there's just something so innate and depending on your culture and where you live and all those other elements, it can either be magnified or not.

But for me, it was just I found my diary at eight years old and I was already shaming myself over my weight and already not able to see clearly in the mirror, if you will. Yes. Yeah. Ugh. My goodness. And it's not even better today. Social media is full of how you should look, and women are just modeling themselves and no wonder women are 

[00:07:00] obsessed with wanting to be a certain body type 'cause in our face every single day, all the time.

Yeah. All the time. That's exactly right. And clearly you are in another country, so this isn't just in the States thing, right? Yeah. Tell us where you are. I'm in Australia. Yeah. Awesome. So let's talk about where this began to take you. So you're getting great results. You're competing, you're feeling victorious, but there was something much darker and deeper going on behind the scenes. Take us down that road. 

So in a total of three years, I did 11 bodybuilding competitions. And that was all back to back. So if I wasn't in a bikini prep, I wasn't preparing for a competition. I was basically out of control. I was very scared to be in that scenario as well. Hence why I kept going from back-to-back competition perhaps because that's when I could control it.

[00:08:00] That's when I had to track everything, count everything to the detail so that I wouldn't go out of control and I had a date to stick to. I had to be on stage. So there was no choice but to stick to what you're doing. However, during those little phases and post com and even before comp, there was a lot of binge eating disorder issues.

And. Some of them gotten very dark into purging as well, so that's, that was hard to understand. Very confusing at the time. Now I look back and know exactly why and how that happened, it starts off with, you're so obsessed with food. You're around food every single day, and that's all you know and dieting for so long.

For years, not just month years, you're just hungry and craving all these foods that you are supposedly not allowed to have that 

[00:09:00] when you do get access to them and there's no competition date, you just go crazy. So it would be very blurry, foggy moments of binge eating and to the point where you are hiding wrappers or in a car, driving to the next fuel station to get snacks and just eating in the car 'cause that's your safe space and feeling so full that you have no choice but to bring it back up if you have to. But yeah. Yeah, that's, 

And would you say that all of that behavior is just this desire to control the world around you? Yeah. Is that what it really is? It's, yeah, you the loss of control, so you need to gain it back.

Wow. And you're in, yeah. So much pain that you need to relieve yourself. It's, it is very dark. Yeah. And you didn't have the Lord. And were you able to 

[00:10:00] talk with people while you were going through this, or was it just truly a long season of just suffering in silence? 

Suffering silence for a good few years until I did seek help especially post comp.

I realized that this is not normal and I'm sick of doing it on my own. I did go to a doctor and got diagnosed, went to therapy. I tried. I even tried some things like kinesiology. I did hypnotherapy. I did, or I went to a dietician. Dietician was the best part for me. She helped the most in terms of all those non-Christian things like Jesus definitely helped me the most, which we'll get to.

But before that, the dietician was definitely the most helpful. But I was willing to try anything by that point. 'cause I was so sick of it. I was sick of the binge restrict cycle and that's constantly what it was. Just being in Yeah. Just a cycle. And I think that's, there's something very, I important that I've learned 

[00:11:00] through the years of walking with the Lord is that no real change has ever occurred until I became willing.

Yeah, and I couldn't do it on my own. Never can. That is not the way of the normal Christian walk, but there is this part of us that has to make a decision. And once you make that decision, then a lot of times nothing can stop you. It's not linear and it's up and down of course, actually by the time we're listening to this, there's an episode that I will have done where I talk about there's two natures we're born with. We have that part the Bible refers to is the Adamic nature.

It's of the first Adam, meaning that the lust of our flesh, the appetites of our soul. It's scripture says that our flesh is contrary to the spirit, right? What we want to do, we don't do. And so there's a part of us that doesn't naturally just wanna follow the Lord. It wants to just take the easy way out.

[00:12:00] It wants to fill its own appetites. And I used to shame myself or condemn myself for. For the wrestling between that nature and the nature of the spirit inside me of God. And now what I want listeners to know is, listen, there's, you're always gonna have that fight as long as you're human because a part of you doesn't, it wasn't born to want to follow the Lord. That's where, that's really good to know. Yeah. That's where the power of choice is powerful. It's powerful. And when we, if you think about this desire to want to control, that's where we have real control is in our own choice.

Yeah. We take back power when we take back our choice. Yes. Yeah. So that's really cool. Yeah. I love that. Okay. Got, got on a little soapbox there. Preaching from the pulpit over here. I love it. I love it. So let's talk about your time with the dietician. And I love that you found something, and that's the other 

[00:13:00] thing I would want listeners to remember is that what worked for you may not work for me. It's a trial and error alot of times. We've got to find the tool that's gonna work for us or the series of tools that'll work for us. So I'm glad the dietician worked for you. what did that look like? What began to really help you turn the corner? 

Yeah, she basically just said to me, you've been dieting for so long, you need to stop.  So I stopped and I listened to her and I, it was really hard 'cause I had gained the most weight. I was the heaviest I ever was. And I was uncomfortable, but I needed to do it. She's you have so much control. You need to let go and just do what you, your body is craving. And even though I did gain all that weight, it was just worth it to feel, to lose that fear around food and going out and enjoying foods and instead of canceling social outings, I would go to the social outings and just experience that life. 

[00:14:00] Because during the bikini preps, I wasn't going out, I wasn't doing any stuff. I was definitely a no person. Whereas I got the chance to say yes and do all those things. Even then, I, once I gained all that weight, I said to him like, this has been good.

I feel like I'm mentally ready to lose that weight now because I didn't feel comfortable in my clothes. But it definitely helped the mental side of it. I admire you so much for that particular moment in time because I can't even imagine how hard that was. Like you clearly were ready for that because I could even feel how hard that would be in my own life.

Was there any structure at all? Did you just simply put no guardrails on yourself and you allowed yourself to go out? Pretty much. No guardrails. She did give me, say try and stick to this amount of calories. If you go over, okay, who cares? Okay. I would go over every single day. I was, I think we recommend around 2000.

[00:15:00] I was eating probably three and a half thousand calories a day, so I was going to gain the weight fairly quick. Sure. But I apparently needed it. Wow. That's amazing. Okay. At that moment too, like my brain and my stomach aren't connected. They weren't connected. They were not talking to each other. What I was feeling in my stomach was not the fullness in my brain.

I could keep eating and eating until my stomach felt like it was about to burst. Yeah. Yeah. No no off switch, right? People say, just eat till you're hungry. And I've never been able to just eat until I'm no longer hungry to you. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Okay. So now you're at this point and you're like, okay, I think I'm mentally ready to lose the weight in a healthy way.

What did that look like? That was pretty much just tracking mac calories and macros. And it was going. It went pretty well. I got, I lost about 10 to 12 kilos 

[00:16:00] in over a year, I'd say. And I did it because my best friend was getting married. I was a maid of honor. I wanted to look good, like better. I wanted to feel better about myself, and I felt good.

But once it hit that I, that I think it was about 58 kilos, like once I was 10, 12 kilos down. I could feel myself start to be like, oh no, I wanna eat more. Like it, all those habits were starting to come back and that freaked me out. 

Yeah. I was, getting those habits were coming back where I wanted to binge and purge again. And I was like, I thought I was over this.  I don't know what's going on. I'm really confused. And I was mad. I was really mad. There were times, there was days that I felt really good, but then there was other times where I didn't know what to do anymore. So I just thought, this is me. This is how I'm gonna live. This is how I have to live with myself constantly.

Dieting and struggling. Gaining weight dieting. 

[00:17:00] Struggling. Yeah. Wow. That's okay. And so you caught it. You were aware and you didn't go back in those behaviors, but how did you now deal with, okay, you've got this new mindset of this must just be the way it's always gonna be.

Where did you go from there? And then at what point did you find the Lord? Let's take it down that road. So this is where I started to find the Lord. Just when I started to accept it, I had a friend, I met someone who became my best friend and introduced Christianity to me. And I thought it was just not for me.

It was not for me. And I was very curious though. I kept questioning her and challenging her in a way that I started becoming intrigued. All of the things that she was saying was making sense. So I said, I'm gonna buy a Bible, read it, and then come back to you and show you. It's just a silly and I read the Bible and I was like, oh my gosh.

[00:18:00] I think I'm a believer. I think I belong here. And then, yeah, I just kept getting super, super curious. Kept learning about the Bible, kept learning about Jesus. Fast track it to where I was still having episodes of binge eating, but I remember just lying there in bed one night and I was like, Jesus, I am so done with overeating.

I'm so done. Take it from me. I don't know. I don't know what else to do. Then I was hearing about spiritual fasting. Yeah, I, one of my friends was like, oh yeah, I just, I did a fast for a day and I was like, what is this fasting intermittent fasting 'cause I don't know what that what are you doing? She said, no, we just it's just where you go without food for however long just so you can connect with God more. And I was like, that's really cool. I kind of wanna try that one day. 

[00:19:00] And I did day fast here and there. And at that point I realized, wow, I can actually live without food for one whole day.

This is crazy. I thought we would, die. Like it's, it was just so cool to me. Yeah. And you were doing it from a different, starting, your motive was different, right? Yeah. You weren't, this wasn't a starvation in order to look perfect kind of thing. This was a different motive, which matters. Yeah.

Yeah. And I think that's really crucial to to define there is fasting in a disordered way, and then there's spiritual fasting, which this is why I don't like. To bring it up to any, just anyone all the time. Yeah. Because it can come across as, I'm just trying to starve myself. Yeah. I really wanted to try out this fasting thing for the Lord, because it's like a booster to talk to him in prayer.

And I did read it multiple times throughout the Bible where Jesus said, when you fast and pray 

[00:20:00] when you pray and fast, and it's not if it's, but it's when. Love that. So I really wanted to give this a go and see how amplified my prayers could get. And yeah, just one day I just felt the need to fast for three days and three nights.

Like he said, you should fast for three days and three nights and just see how you feel. See her, how it helps you. And I told my husband now and he's yeah, let's fast for three days and three nights and. Ever since that fast, I've been the most mentally stable around food that I've ever been in my entire well since high school.

And don't get me wrong, I still have slip ups where my brain goes back into the flesh human. I just wanna eat everything. And that's when I can tell, okay, I need to do a spiritual fast again. That's my safeguard. And I will use it as much as I need to. 

[00:21:00] Because it just sets me in the right head space.

I can, yeah, I feel like I can say yes to everything and I don't wanna overeat anymore. I don't want to binge when I've done a good fast. I did one a few days ago because I just, I could tell I needed it. I needed to clear my head. I needed to talk to. God and just say, help me. I'm, I feel like I'm going backwards, and then I do it, and then I'm back thinking clearly it's like a whole new being is in my body again.

Yeah. Yeah. It's that abiding in the Lord. We talk, we use this language in the Christian realm, but these are practical applications of that very principle and When I'm consistently applying spiritual fasting for the right reasons, I am just, I'm so much more at peace. My, my natural body loves it.

It's so physiologically good for you. 

[00:22:00] There's such science behind it. Yes. The healing. It's amazing. Yeah, all the different benefits to the body because of it. I'm even now in a season full on transparency where I gotta get back to that because like I was doing a I was doing just intermittent fasting every day 'cause my body just likes it better. I'd eat between say 11 and 5, but then fasting for the rest of the time and my body loves it. Yeah. And then it's moving clearly once a week. Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. Clears out the fog. Clears out the inflammation. Yes. Reset your hormones. Reset your body's ability, every organ to work the way it needs to. And then once a week, I was doing 36 or more hours, just once a week. Yeah. And all of it was for the actual motive of health and not, oh, I've gotta lose weight, or I've gotta Yes. Yeah. 

So I can tell back to the whole, there's two natures in us. I can tell I don't want to do it. I'm just not at that place of I wanna do it. And that's where I have to make a decision. 

[00:23:00] Do I do it? Do I not do it? And that's where it's like I don't need to go dissect this with a therapist. In this particular case, it is just for me in this moment, it's a matter of my will.

And that's where I have to just get honest with myself and then accept whatever choice I'm gonna make. So yeah, that's not shame, that's not condemnation. That is just the reality of where I am in my own life right now. Yeah. Yeah. And fasting isn't easy. There's a reason, there's a consequence to it.

The sacrifice. Yeah. It's a sacrifice and it's Right, but the benefits are worth it. And prayers are, a lot of prayers get answered. I've, yes. You can just feel that his presence is there. It's a weapon of our warfare. That's what scripture says, right? And those are the weapons we use as Christians.

Prayer and fasting. And fasting is the one least talked about and not as consistent a habit in the body of Christ. And that doesn't surprise me. The enemy's gonna go 

[00:24:00] after the very foundational principles that are really, are our weapons. Yeah. And it, me and my husband talk about this a lot.

It's not like it's a drug that you. You don't need you need food eventually so about 40 days where you actually need food. So we do need it. So it's an easy temptation. It's not something we can just get rid of and never look at it again. Yeah it's easy to use against us yeah.

Yeah. as you were starting to make this transition and you started implementing spiritual fasting, how was your relationship with the Lord changing and how was your relationship with food changing? 

Yeah at first, my relationship with the Lord was strictly theoretical. I didn't know him at first. I just understood what everything was. I didn't understand the Trinity at first. It was very confusing to me and I couldn't wrap my brain around. And I think once I understood that, 

[00:25:00] that's when I could understand Jesus. And yeah there was definitely a lot of things I was going through at the start of my Christianity a lot of sad things were happening and I couldn't understand, but I knew that I had faith in Jesus to get me out, and I look back now and I'm so happy that I kept that faith because he gave me so much more than I ever expected. so many people that used to know me when I struggling through the binge eating the disorders, the previous life I had before Christianity, which was about two years ago, they've come to me recently and said, you're so happy. I don't know what you've done.

You're so different now. I couldn't recognize you. You're so much happier now. And I'm like, yeah, I found Jesus. You should do it too. He is real, I promise you. I didn't even expect him to heal me from an eating disorder or help me with an eating disorder. 

[00:26:00] I expected to have things change like my faith and who I love and like conviction of other Christian values, but I didn't expect the eating disorder, so I think that's why I held it tightly. I didn't fully let it go until I was like, okay, I am done. I need you to help me with this. And I'm so grateful that he's brought me out of something that has been a challenge for 10 years, and I know the solution now.

Even if I can't be fully a hundred percent cured right now. I know what I need to do to get my head space clear again. Yeah. I feel like I'm normal again. And I never thought I'd be able to. I just, I used to say, I just wanna be able to eat normal, like a normal person. I can't, I don't know how to do that anymore.

And I just feel so much more normal if normal is the word quotation. Yeah. And so you are driven by different motives now for sure. 

[00:27:00] Yes. What does eating look like for you now? Yeah. what is a typical day like for you now? I take every day as it comes differently. And I can usually feel how I'm going to eat tomorrow, the day before.

So some days I don't eat until the afternoon because I just feel like my body's saying you, I think you need to fast a little bit just clear your head see how you feel. And then the next day I have breakfast. I'll have protein with every meal. I still know how to eat. As a nutritionist, I still know what foods to eat in order to hit macro targets in a protein target, so I'll have a lot of yoga. I love yogurt. And then I'll have a lunch in the afternoon, dinner at night and dessert. It's, it really just depends how I'm feeling and thinking and how much energy I have. I don't have this strictness around 

[00:28:00] it that I used to. I don't have a set way of what I'm supposed to eat at what time.  And I don't set. I have to eat every three hours. I don't set any point and no control over it because the more control I have on that, the less control I feel like I have. So the more control I give to Jesus and trusting him to get me through the day the more free I feel. I don't feel scared.

I don't have that fear around it. That's amazing. Yeah. Such a difference between chasing a crown on stage versus receiving a crown of life in Jesus. Yeah. Yeah. Two different crowns for sure. 

So one of the things that has come to me as we've been talking, and I have had to remind myself of this in, it's so encouraging, but scripture says that the Lord, delights in small beginnings. He delights in seeing the work begin. 

[00:29:00] If you're like me, you want it all now and you want it to be a one and done, like I am not by nature a marathon runner. I am a sprinter, and I have had to, turn life into a series of sprints to withstand the reality of the marathon life we have to live.

And a lot of times it's about being steadfast and disciplined and consistent and so I guess. What would you want to say to the listeners who really struggle with that? What would be some of your advice 

Yes. Focusing on the health part of it. I would ask them who are they comparing themselves to? What's in their social media feed? Are they wanting to be like a certain person? Are they tempted by weight loss promises that are like frequently advertised, like bad diets. Or can they just zone out and think I'm doing this for my health because weight loss can be a good consequence of that focusing on health.

[00:30:00] Yeah. And do it in a way that is sustainable and long-term, and that isn't going to restrict their life that they're gonna rebound later. Take it from someone who's done that over and over A lot of people have done that over and over again. They want the quick fix, but they're not thinking of that future person.

Like these people that are doing the quick fix fixes, but they're not learning the habits and they're not enjoying it either. It's just miserable. Yeah. Yeah. And that's when disorder habits can come as well. Yeah. They start getting obsessed with the foods that they can't have or that they feel like they can't have, and then they just go crazy.

But I would say invite Jesus on the journey because he knows you best and he knows when you're ready how to do it. We always pay for other people's accountability. Jesus', accountability is free. It's free for us. 

[00:31:00] Yeah. Amazing. And I, you're on that moment and you said to the Lord, I'm done. I'm done. Take this from me. What began to happen? What are some ways that you began to realize he was showing up in your life? What did that look like?

Was it just that it became easier for you to make the right decision? Your desires began to change, Yes. There was just more peace in my brain. A lot more peace. Yeah. And a lot more awareness. I think that was very instant. So because of that, I could train different habits. He also gave me a beautiful husband who has excellent habits and he knows when to say, no, I don't want the rest of the chocolate bar.

Whereas I've always wanted the entire chocolate bar, so it's impressive for me to watch that. He is a really good influence and I can see what he does, and I'm like, huh, I can do that too. 

[00:32:00] Yeah, I just needed to retrain habits and Jesus gave me that peace and quietness for me to be able to do yeah. Less noise for sure. Amazing. when it comes to your husband, like that's just another fun, I'm sure. Fun story because did you ever have a time when you realized your belief system was such that, okay, I'm never gonna get a husband if I look, if I gain weight. Was there ever just a conscious awareness of something like that as a belief system and what did that look like?

Yeah. I definitely. Didn't wanna be unattractive to anyone and I thought I was unattractive. And social media can be quite harsh too. Some people can make comments, especially when you've gained weight and they've seen you lean for most of the life they've met you. They're comparing that heavier person to that lean person, and you feel like you're not 

[00:33:00] allowed to be yeah, gained weight anymore because you've seen your best self. Yeah. Quotations, best self. and it's crushing because you are struggling and people, you are just, you are comparing yourself to other people or that old self, and no one's gonna love you if you are this big or this size. Yeah. So that's another scary thing. Yeah. Yeah, super scary.

And I've even, at times I've even boy, how do I say this, that logic. Isn't even real if you just simply look around you and see the incredibly beautiful variety of all shapes and sizes. Yeah. Of people who love one another and are perfectly happy and fine in relationships, and so for me it's, there's, the scripture talks about taking captive every thought and making it obedient to the Lord.

And this is where my decision and my 

[00:34:00] will comes in, where it's like, what I've been doing lately is every time those old familiar thoughts come, I pause and I say, that's not even real. Like I'll even at times write down the thought that I'm having and the feeling associated with it. And then I will write down why it's a lie.

Even though it feels true, it doesn't line up with scripture. And I have to decide to let scripture be my truth and be my standard. And I'm at that place now where it's like. Lord, I just wanna live healthy and love myself. 'cause this is all for so many of us. This is about loving ourselves and and then recognizing the value God has placed on us.

There's a series of books written by Lisa Bevere and she is just got some incredible testimony around this topic and. Advice for people who are wanting to overcome and she talks about, you're not what you see in the mirror. That's the least part of you.

[00:35:00] There's so much more to us than our physical self. There's so much more. Yeah. And so now it's Lord, I just wanna be healthy. Living in peace, eating because I'm hungry, but also allowing myself to enjoy things. Yeah, it's a journey. It's a journey for sure. Yes.

Yeah. And it's funny because men are like, we don't even look at what you've. You women look at like they're not even wired the same way and they're not even paying attention to it. I remember dating a guy and I was all caught up in my weight and this and that, and he's Ugh, I just want you to be confident.

He's I think you're beautiful. I just want you to be confident. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. We do get picky. Absolutely. Yeah. And we don't have to be perfect straight away either. So I think there's a lot of grace in that. Yeah. And people don't give themselves grace, and that's where it's all black and white thinking.

Yeah. Yeah. There's no gray area. And if the belief systems don't get dealt with now, it's harder the older we get. Yeah. Like I was sharing with you, I just turned 54 and things are not what they used to be. 

[00:36:00] And it's you have to be able to embrace and love yourself and accept the natural order of things and that things do change as we get older. And it's funny because I look back and I'm like, dang, I didn't get to enjoy where I was back then because all the while I was critiquing myself. And that perfection, inner critic self condemnation, was always there measuring me against unattainable standards.

And and so I didn't enjoy it. And now I'm thinking. I kind of wanna enjoy where I am today because 10 years from now I'm gonna look back and wish I was back to where I am today. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, I think about that all the time. Yeah. Oh my gosh. So what does it look like now to love yourself?

What does that feel like? How are you doing with that? Yeah, it's literally a day by day adventure. we're blessed with lots of fruit and vegetables and all the good foods, but when we have date night, once a week or once a fortnight, we'll go for it and we'll have something that's a little fried or something, to enjoy.

[00:37:00] Yeah. And same with my workouts. I used to be very bodybuilding, have to lift a certain way and. That is definitely true. If you want a certain physique, if you really wanna have a competitive body for bodybuilding, you have to do it a certain way to get the most from it. There is science to it, but I just wanna go to the gym and move I try and zone in and think I just wanna move the way that feels good.

And that I know is gonna benefit me in the future. I don't have to lift so much weight. I just, people need to do something that's sustainable for them. And that's the same with my clients. I want them to do something that they love, that is sustainable for them and that feels healthy. Not something that they're going to commit to do it for two weeks and then drop off because it was too hard, it was too unsustainable for them.

[00:38:00] Yeah. And I also walk a lots, I love walking. I think it's amazing. Yeah. I think walking's just this easy, healthy thing that everyone should do if you Yep same. I bought one of those little treadmills that you put under your desk and I was I was in meetings 'cause I'm blessed to be able to work from home three days a week and there's certain meetings that I don't have to worry about how I look or, being offered on camera.

And I'll just walk while we're having the meeting and it's just so wonderful. What do you think you would tell your younger self? I firstly say Jesus is real. Go study him. Go get to know him, trust me.

And I would tell her all I wish I knew about food science before I dived into fad diets and cutting out carbs. Because it wasn't a long-term solution, I just wish I could have known about the cool things about food and how body fat loss works at that age. But yeah, I wish I knew Jesus sooner.

However, I know that wasn't the path that we had. I feel like He, He 

[00:39:00] showed me what I need to go through in order to help more people that are going through the same thing and that there is a way out. I feel like I needed to experience that time in my life to really understand how to help others that are going through the same thing.

Yeah. Yeah. He met me where I was at, and I guess I would just tell her like, it's gonna be okay. Yeah. there'll be bad things, but it's never going to be that bad because we have him

What do you do for a living and how do you work with people today? So I'm a remote nutritionist and fitness coach. Okay. It's very recent that I started the business. At first I started and there was this part of me that almost got sucked back into doing it the bodybuilding way because that's how I knew how through knowledge.

And I can definitely help people who wanna look like that. Be like that, but I could just feel the Lord pulling me back saying, that's not you anymore. 

[00:40:00] You need to help people that just want to live their life normally. I know I'm using very broad terms, but so I gave in, I was like, I think you're right. Like I, I felt. I don't know a better word for ick. I didn't, I felt like something was wrong when I could tell that I was going back to the bodybuilding stuff. Yeah. And I even started to do it myself. I started to get a little bit too obsessed and I was like, hang on, something feels wrong.

And then I gave it back to him and I'm just trusting that he will attract clients that wants to do it his way. Yeah. Yeah I, it's really funny. I was thinking today, and I can't believe, I haven't thought about it sooner, but I've been wanting to be a online nutritionist for 10 years now.

I'd say, like ever since I started learning about bodybuilding. Yeah. And I wanted to be a bodybuilding competition coach, and I wanted to start I tried to study, I got into a couple universities, but something kept pulling me out, and it 

[00:41:00] wasn't until. The end of last year that I graduated finally with my nutrition degree and now I can help people and I can just see Jesus yeah, 

I had you wait till you were ready because you weren't ready to be a nutrition back then. You needed to wait to help people now because you weren't ready. Yeah. So I just thought that was really cool. A little revolution. That's amazing today. Amazing. I was like, wow, that's amazing. It's taken me this long.

I know, right? But that's, God's patterns, biblical patterns. he moves at a pace. I know our flesh doesn't like, but there's such purpose in it. He really works a work in us before. It comes out. I use the analogy of giving birth the seed is planted, conception happens, and then it's a long time before that baby comes out of the womb because things have to grow, things have to be fed, things get pushed out of the way

[00:42:00] there's pain involved. Stretching is involved. There's all these things happening inside of you. Before it's time for that baby to come out. So it's very appropriate as a metaphor when it comes to our life. And it's, yeah. Yeah. I think as 2 Corinthians 5:17, therefore, if any man be in Christ, he's a new creature, old things are passed away, behold all things or become new and in Christ, he makes all things new.

And that's what he is done with you. And it's I'm just honored to know you. I'm ins. Inspired by your journey. I've already been on a journey of my own in this particular way. I was never a bodybuilder, but I have had all the body dysmorphia and just all the unhealthy associations with the body and with food and I'm on a journey of my own of overcoming and I'm like.

As soon as I get off this call, I'm gonna go run and just be with the Lord and pray and bring him into my journey even more than I already have. And and so if so, I just bless you, I honor you. 

[00:43:00] How can our listeners get in touch with you, Lydia? What's the best way? Yeah, so I, I have Instagram, it's just lydfitcoaching.

L-Y-D-F-I-T-L-Y-D-F-I-T. Okay. Yeah. Under coaching. My website is lydfitcoaching.com and my email is lid fit coaching@gmail.com. So yeah, L-Y-D-F-I-T. And yeah, just I love to help women learn how to fit in their nutrition with the way their life works. And not against it because life is for living, not for dieting all the time, but you can yeah. Definitely live in find balance. Yes. Yeah. And it's a long-term thing, not a short quick fix. Yeah. Amen. Sister. We gotta have vision, don't we? scripture says who, for the joy set before him, he endured the cross and, possessing our soul taking captive our thoughts.

[00:44:00] Letting his nature grow in us so that the fruit of self-control is produced. These are all long-term disciplines that you have to build that muscle. You know this, it's an exercise daily exercising, but for the joy set before him, he endured the cross. So while we are having to die to ourself daily if we've got that.

Vision that joy set before us, we can endure the process because we have a, we have idea of where we're heading, right? Long term. And we gotta have our eye on the ball. And I just think that there's, we could probably do a whole nother episode just on practical, tactical ways that the principles of scripture translate into what this looks like on a daily basis. Absolutely. Yeah. If you don't mind, I'm feeling a nudge to just pray. I'm gonna pray for you and me and our listeners. I just feel like God would have us do that today before we close out.

So Father, you are you're so good Lord and Lord, there's not a quick 

[00:45:00] fix, but you're immediately available to us, Father as as the actual answer to our problem. So Father, we just pray. We know that your word says that if we pray according to your will, we have what we have asked. We know that we have the authority because of our faith in the blood of Jesus to be able to bind in loose.

And so Father, we just unite and we bind every familiar spirit that is attempting to come against our listeners. For everyone listening to this message, would you anoint this message and bring hope to our listener? Would you bind the familiar spirits that have built their belief systems and grew weeds in their garden of their soul, and would you just ignite a new fresh hope in them?

Would you give them wisdom? Would you help them just feel your presence right now where they are? Father and would you just help them use their 

[00:46:00] power of choice and bring faith as small as a mustard seed and just take that small beginning. Just take that next step. Father, God, would you help them?

Father, we pray a blessing over. Every listener, we just pray an anointing, a powerful anointing over this episode, and that you would be so magnified and you would be so glorified, and together as your daughters, we could overcome the death that the enemy would wanna bring, and we could. Take back the land that was meant to be ours, and we could live in peace and live fully and live abundant lives because you come to bring life and to bring it more abundantly.

Father, I bless my sister Lydia. She is a light. Help her to not keep the light under a bushel, but to just bring it to the world. Would you bless her business? Would you multiply it and would you keep her? under your wing and keep her in life. Father, protect her marriage, protect all that she's doing and just help her 

[00:47:00] to grow in the love and the knowledge of Jesus even more.

Father, thank you for connecting us. Thank you for another day of life. Thank you for what the blood of Jesus has already done for us. Thank you for your Holy Spirit and for allowing us to walk this life with you. Father, we love you. We bless you in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. You're such a blessing, my sister.

I can't wait to touch base again at some point and hear even more of a testimony.

[Music] 

Wow, What a powerful story of God's grace, wasn't it? Lydia's journey reminds us that no matter how deep perfectionism runs, Jesus is greater and his freedom is real. This is such a needed conversation in our culture today. We're just surrounded by. The strongholds in this space so,if Lydia's testimony spoke to you today, I wanna encourage you to share it with one person at least. 

[00:48:00] other And if you haven't already, you will definitely want to go back and listen to episodes 12 and 13 where Nicole and I talk about shame so often struggles with our bodies, food, perfection. All of it comes from a root of shame. And when you begin to recognize and heal that shame in light of God's truth, freedom in other areas like body image, it becomes possible.

So check out those episodes.  And be sure to subscribe to the Redeemed Perfectionist. You're going to hear from more folks just like Lydia, as well as find encouragement for how you might be able to overcome similar issues in your own life.

If you're looking for a tribe of women to lock arms with, head on over to our Facebook community, the Redeemed Perfectionist, where we share stories and where we lock arms with one another and encourage one another to grow in our journeys with Jesus. 

[00:49:00] Remember sis, you don't have to strive for perfect when you're already redeemed.

See you next time.