February 19, 2025 • 44 mins
In this episode of The Confident Woman Podcast, host Rachel Brooks sits down with Christine Trimpe, a transformative wellness leader and founder of SugarFreed Me. Christine shares her powerful story of losing 100 pounds, overcoming sugar addiction, and reclaiming her health—physically, emotionally, and spiritually. If you’ve struggled with food cravings, diet cycles, or self-doubt, this episode is for you.
In This Episode, We Cover:
- [00:00:00] Christine’s journey from sugar addiction to food freedom
- [00:03:00] The turning point: a mountain climb that changed everything
- [00:08:00] How sugar impacts hormones and metabolism
- [00:14:00] Breaking free from emotional eating and self-doubt
- [00:21:00] Biblical insights on identity, health, and confidence
- [00:30:00] Practical steps to reduce sugar and regain energy
- [00:41:00] The power of daily surrender in your health journey
Resources & Links from the Show
📖 Get Christine’s Book: SugarFreed: Stop Losing the Weight Loss Battle, Start Gaining the Victory → Buy on Amazon
🎁 Free Gift for Listeners: Get an exclusive chapter excerpt → SugarFreedGift.com
🔗 Connect with Christine Trimpe
- Website: ChristineTrimpe.com
- Instagram: @coachchristinetrimpe
- LinkedIn: Christine Trimpe
- Facebook: Christine Trimpe
📩 Stay Connected with Rachel Brooks & The Confident Woman Podcast
- Join The Confident Woman Community: Facebook Group
- Subscribe to The Confident Woman Weekly Newsletter: iamrachelbrooks.com/subscribe
- Shop The Confident Woman Products: iamrachelbrooks.com/resources
- Follow Rachel on Instagram: @iamrachelbrooks
💬 If you enjoyed this episode, let’s continue the conversation inside our community!
Connect with Rachel:
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hey there and welcome to the Confident Woman podcast.
(00:06):
I'm your host Rachel Brooks.
Join me as I sit down and chat with co-hosts, friends, and carefully curated guests and
talk about all the things that empower you to become your best and most confident self.
So let's get started.
All right ladies, welcome back.
Today we have with us Christine Trimp.
Christine is a transformative wellness leader dedicated to empowering professional Christian
(00:30):
women to reclaim their health and vitality through her faith-based holistic approach
to weight loss.
As the founder of the Sugar-Free Me method and a certified sugar licensed practitioner,
Christine helps clients achieve lifelong healing from sugar addiction and food-related struggles.
Her clients experience dramatic transformations including sustained weight loss and breakthroughs
(00:53):
in physical, emotional, and spiritual health with over 80% retention in her programs after
a personal story of losing a hundred pounds, which we...
I'm not even going to finish this bio because I'm about to pass this mic over to Christine
because she's got a beautiful, profound story and I want her to tell this.
So Christine, welcome.
(01:14):
Thank you for having me, Rachel.
I'm completely overjoyed to be here with you today.
Oh my gosh.
Even before we started Here, Recore, we were just talking about our passions and just really
what has been moving in our lives and the works that we do and just these transformational
journeys that we both have been on in similar but yet different paths.
And it has led us back to our same core message is to empower others, right?
(01:38):
So we live and lead from our own place.
And so I'd love for you to unpack some of the story and how you got started into all
the things that you're doing today.
Yeah.
And I love that you brought up empower because that really is one of my greatest passions
is to empower women to quit sugar and claim weight loss victory.
And I say once and forever and to live in this freedom and greater joy.
(02:02):
So I will start with a story where my life completely transformed.
And I'll go back to my childhood a little bit later, but about 10 years ago right now,
I was standing at the foot of a mountain in the beautiful Rocky Mountain National Park.
My husband and I were there on our 25th anniversary trip and he had planned out some trails for
(02:26):
us to travel.
And he said, we went around Bear Lake, if you've ever been there, that's a really flat
trail around there.
And that was like very easy, no exhaustion, nothing like that.
And he said, well, I want to go climb to the Nymph Lake.
And I was like, okay, so we went over to the trail marker and I looked at the trail marker
and it said a half a mile to Nymph Lake.
(02:47):
And I'm like, okay, I can do a half a mile.
But then I looked it up and I was like, oh no, like that trail went straight up.
And my heart kind of sunk a little bit, but I wanted to give it my best effort.
So it started hiking up this trail with my husband and it wasn't very long retail before
I could not go another step further.
I was gasping for air and I just could not continue on that path.
(03:14):
And the reason being is because I was at a very difficult health place in my life.
I was a hundred pounds overweight, classified as morbidly obese at the time, which naturally
left me gasping for that air on the side of a mountain in Rocky Mountain National Park.
So I told my husband to go ahead and go on without me.
(03:36):
I just can't go another step.
And he was like, are you sure?
I'm like, yes, I'm positive.
Just go.
And I wanted to sit by myself for a few minutes on the side of that path.
And I sound the stump and I sat there and just really had a, I call it my take ownership
moment.
I remember thinking that I just can't go on living like this any longer.
(03:59):
Like I'm exhausted.
I'm moody.
I'm crabby.
I'm not enjoying this.
In fact, I did not even enjoy the fact that I had to like walk to the trailhead.
Like I was regretting going to the mountains, if that makes sense, you know, at the time,
because I knew I wasn't going to be able to climb, but I really did want to give it my
(04:20):
best effort.
So I sat there and I remember just saying a little prayer.
God, I just want to feel better.
Like I just want to feel better.
I want to stop feeling sick and tired all the time.
And at that point in my life, being obese for 30 years, I never expected to lose weight.
I thought I was meant to be fat forever.
And so my prayer wasn't Lord help me lose this weight.
(04:42):
My prayer was, I just want to feel better.
And something really shifted in my life at that moment, sitting by myself on the side
of the path.
I decided to go home from that trip.
I had a new resolve in my heart.
And so I did go home.
I did take ownership.
I did schedule a doctor's appointment that I'd been putting off for many, many years.
(05:03):
The first medical intervention I did was a sleep study.
And that really just started me down the path of this transformation story that took me
from being a woman that can't climb mountains to now being a certified Christian health
and wellness coach and encouraging other women to show up at the foot of that mountain and
(05:24):
let's do the climb together.
So that's where I'm at and I am excited to be here to share all of this with your audience
today.
Wow.
What a beautiful story.
And you know, it's like it's found in the everyday moments.
Those you got to throw whispers, right?
Oh my goodness.
I'm, I'm, I'm over here like jotting down these notes and I'm thinking, gosh, how many
(05:45):
of us women are just journeying this life and there's just a standing point in our life
where just we can't go on anymore.
We can't do this.
Yeah.
And I think how many times has this happened?
It's just like brought us to our knees in like a prayer moment or something that buckles
where we're just that last ditch effort.
And sometimes that's where we find God or maybe where we are finally aware that God
(06:08):
had been there and we meet God.
Yes.
Yes.
And God will meet you anywhere at the foot of the hill of this, this trail.
On your knees crying, you never know.
And it's just these moments that are so life changing.
And I love your story of how profound it is.
And you know, as you're going through and this journey first started with that medical
(06:30):
intervention.
So let's kind of walk us through that journey.
I'm curious to know how this all transpired.
Yeah.
So let me just back up a little bit to my childhood and share that I, because you mentioned
about just praying and the Lord finding me, I was very blessed in that moment that he
did, I feel like he did reach out to me.
(06:52):
That was the huge blessing because I did grow up in a Christian home.
I grew up going to church.
I grew up having been surrounded by Christian friends, but for 30 years, I was very casual
about my faith.
I call it my casual Christian years.
And so I never really invited the Lord into my health journey.
And I never invited him into like, why am I feeling so miserable?
(07:16):
Why do I have so much despair?
It was a very, I'm a very type A person.
I was trying to control all the things.
So in that moment, I always say like what David writes in Psalm 40 about sitting in
the pit, I got it reached down and he lifted me up from that miry pit and he put my feet
on a solid rock and he put a new song in my mouth.
(07:37):
And it has definitely been a journey from coming home from Colorado, coming back to
Michigan, having that sleep study.
The reason I put it off, Rachel, is because I did not want to come home with a CPAP machine.
That just did not sound fun to me.
But I have to tell you that that CPAP machine really changed my life.
I started sleeping better.
(07:58):
And when I started sleeping better, I started waking up more refreshed.
I felt a little bit of my brain fog went away and waking up refreshed.
I started the thing that really changed my life more than any dietary choice that I made.
I started picking up my Bible.
First thing in my life, first time in my life.
And I do it, I haven't set it down since because I'm waking up without an alarm now and feeling
(08:23):
refreshed and I thought, what's a girl to do to kill two hours before she has to be
in the corporate office?
That's why I started implementing that into my life.
And then I just started going down a rabbit hole of trying to figure out why my health
issues were compounding.
I had a start to sleep apnea.
Shortly after that Colorado trip, I came home and my painful ovarian cysts were flaring
(08:46):
up again.
So I had an ultrasound.
And then I was diagnosed with fatty liver disease.
And I already knew I was pre-diabetic and I already had daily headaches and I already
had monthly migraine and pain and inflammation.
Just all this stuff was compounding and I wasn't even 50 years old yet.
I was 48.
So my mortality started flashing before my eyes and just really made me super curious.
(09:10):
Now that I had this refreshed waking up in the morning and I was feeling a little bit
better because I was getting better health or better sleep.
Why were all of these issues compiling?
And why was my liver full of fat?
Set me down a rabbit hole of discovering what I needed to know about the standard American
diet that any diet program I had been in before really didn't address.
(09:34):
And that was that sugar is a major hormone disruptor.
Our diet is loaded with sugar.
Even sugar in moderation was detrimental to my health because being pre-diabetic or anybody
that's dealt with type 2 diabetes has probably heard the term insulin resistance.
And so our insulin hormone is out of whack.
(09:54):
And I learned step by step how to heal my insulin hormone, get it stabilized, get my
blood sugar stabilized, ditched the sugar, switched to whole healthy foods with what
I like to call from God's Good Smartest Board.
And that is really truly step by step is what healed my body, my physical body.
The weight loss was amazing, but more importantly, it helped renew my mind.
(10:18):
It helped me adapt new mindset shifts.
And most importantly, because I started picking up God's first thing every morning, the spiritual
growth and change in my life has been the best part of my story.
Wow.
What a beautiful transformation.
I, it's you're sharing this and I'm thinking, you know, so many relate abilities and I just
(10:44):
pull a few from myself.
It's like, I also grew up Christian, Christian values, went to church, did all the things.
There was God, he was kind of like the genie in the bottle God calling him when you need
him and why, to grant me that wish.
And very similarly to you, when I was going through my own transformational journey from
the other side of the spectrum is like for those listening, I suffered body dysmorphia,
(11:07):
eating disorders, disordered eating, laxatives, extremes diet, like all these things.
And it was just, it was this chase for this perfect life, this perfect body, this perfectness
so I could just finally rest because I'm so tired of living this lifestyle that was not
the way I knew that I was supposed to live.
I felt myself after a devastation in my life, just on my knees crying to God.
(11:32):
And I was just like God, if you are really there that I've learned about you in Bible
school and Sunday school and all these things, if there is a God, show me.
And there was just this overwhelming like peace that came over me.
Something I had it, oh, because when you're in that place of just desperation, despair,
And it's like, maybe that was the first thing.
(11:54):
And so like you, I started picking up my Bible
and turning the pages and asking,
where do you want to leave me today?
And it was just a really cool parallel
to see how both of our stories so uniquely different
has the one thing in common.
God was there this whole time in his presence.
Oh my God.
I just can't tell.
I can't tell.
(12:16):
And he will restore you.
And it's not just the physical, he restores your health.
Your spirit, your soul.
And I love, oh my gosh, I love this.
This is giving me goose bumps.
Yeah, me too.
The relatability there and those that are listening,
it's like, how many times in your life
(12:36):
have you felt so alone?
It felt like there was nobody out there and no help.
Nobody understood what you're going through.
And you just had those breakdowns.
And to know that there is,
faith or not, but there is this higher calling
and purpose for your life.
And I believe that that is for every individual
here on this earth, because of my faith
and because of Christine's as well.
(12:58):
And so as you're continuing this journey,
you're picking up your Bible, you're pouring it out,
life is changing.
What starts to become possible,
the things that you never even knew existed?
Oh my goodness.
Well, first of all,
the book of Ephesians chapter two changed my life.
So let me talk about that because I never thought
that this would be possible.
(13:20):
Rachel, because I used to have like intense sugar cravings,
intense junk food cravings.
And we could talk a little bit later
about why that was happening.
But let me hop into Ephesians two for a second.
I always felt like being morbidly obese,
walking into a room full of women,
being at events, social events, things like that.
(13:42):
I always felt like I never fit in.
And so here I'm starting to pick up my Bible.
And the very first, one of the first books I'd studied
was Ephesians, which I'm so grateful for
because it truly changed my life.
In Ephesians chapter two, Paul actually,
in my NIV version, Paul actually talks about craving
all the wrong things.
And I was like, ooh, that was healthily convicting to me.
(14:04):
And I knew, so I was able to really evaluate
and assess like what was I craving?
Why was I coping with food?
What's going on?
I was able to go a little bit deeper with that.
But then that whole chapter is written
about being made alive in Christ.
And I never felt alive about anything.
(14:24):
I felt like I was just trudging through life,
just getting to the next day.
And my biggest desire day to day
was just to crowd pick into bed
and just go to sleep so that I didn't have to face
another hardship or difficulty or whatever.
But the end of that chapter is talking about
(14:45):
the hope that I had all my life that had been absent
was the seat at the table in the heavenly realms with Jesus.
And that was just really,
it was just such a beautiful picture to me
because all along, I believe I was saved as a child.
I get saved in Bible school when I was a child.
(15:07):
All along I had the seat in the heavenly realms
and I never, I never knew that.
I never really realized that.
So even if I didn't fit in anywhere else,
I physically didn't fit in roller coaster seats.
I almost didn't fit in airplane seats.
And again, I felt very awkward often in social situations.
I had that seat that whole time.
And like here's this table waiting for me the entire time.
(15:32):
And that's really what changed my heart,
gave me a firm perspective on who I am
as a chosen daughter of the King, as a believer,
as someone who I do have, like I honestly,
wow, maybe I do have a purpose in this health journey.
Maybe this is God's way of working and making himself real
(15:55):
and making himself known to me
and making me passionate to pursue him.
So that's something I never really thought about
going into it.
And it was just like a beautiful,
beautiful part of the journey was just seeing
who we are in Christ.
I have a new identity.
Like, and it's hard to think about my old identity.
(16:15):
I call her old Christine the way I used to live
where I didn't feel like I fit in anywhere.
And I love to embrace and I love to encourage women.
If you are like ceiling light, you don't belong anywhere.
You do belong, you know, you do belong.
So 100%.
Yes, I can relate to the 100% of the I am and the identity.
(16:38):
Yes. Yes.
That it's something that I think is so unique
and also part of this journey is so much of our identity
gets wrapped up in who we believe that we are
and who the world tells us we should be.
And then when we look at our situation
and our circumstances, we allow that to define us.
(16:59):
And now when we don't feel that we're accepted
or belonged in certain places, we allow that to define us.
And so all of a sudden that the worth and the value
that we have been gifted and blessed with
has now been discounted and discredited
and we feel worthless and undervalued.
(17:21):
And that not enoughness will lead to that chasteness,
striving to be or achieve something more,
but that's not where it's found.
So I love that you brought up the identity.
And if you could see behind me, I have my little plaque.
I am who he says I am.
It's just a great reminder for anyone
on this identity journey,
(17:42):
when we look at our worth and our value,
I want to prompt you to pause for a moment
and ask how you define yourself
and what you define yourself as,
and then look at who you are
and who you're capable of being,
that potential, that untapped potential
and that greatness that lies
(18:03):
within each and every one of us.
So this journey is with this identity
in this new found spirit in life through Ephesians.
Carry on like that.
I'm enthralled by your story.
I love trying to hear your story.
I can't tell your story.
Right, so now like I've been made alive in Christ.
And for the first time in my life,
(18:24):
approaching the age of 50, I actually feel alive.
I feel like I'm thriving and oh, I froze or you froze.
Am I good now?
Yep, you're good.
Okay, I have it.
Okay, so for the first time in my life approaching age 50,
I suddenly feel like I'm alive, like I'm thriving.
Like I have a purpose.
God has a plan for my life.
(18:45):
And like I don't have to live in just the doldrums
of just exist, just merely existing.
Like I could, I can treat my health and wellness correctly
so that I thrive well.
I can influence my family with health and wellness,
(19:05):
and to help them thrive well.
And not only their physical health,
like with the food and the choices that we make in the home,
but just encouraging them in this joy.
It's such a joy-filled journey it's been.
Like joy is the big gift that I was given.
Weight loss was amazing.
Losing 100 pounds, I feel so much better.
(19:26):
All of my chronic health issues have been reversed
or put into remission.
But really the ultimate gift has been stepping
into this freedom that I'd never experienced in my life
and in the greater joy and loving.
So, yes, there's nothing like it.
That's why I'm here talking to you about it.
Yes, and like you said, the freedom,
(19:48):
the freedom to just live the life that you were intended to
and you felt like a prisoner locked in this body
or this stronghold that you couldn't break.
And eventually it wasn't up to you to break it
with the power of God's transformation
to empower you to break free.
And so I'd love for you to share a little bit more about,
(20:08):
with your book, you have a book coming up that,
or actually it's out now, right?
Yes, January 21st it was out.
Yes, yes, awesome.
And so tell us about the, first of all,
what is the title of the book
and tell us a little bit about the book too.
Okay, so the book is titled Sugar-Free'd.
Sugar-Free'd, so it has a D on the end of sugar-free.
(20:29):
Sugar-Free'd, I made that word up.
Sugar-Free'd, stop losing the weight loss battle,
start gaining the victory.
And it is a book to help women also
and experience this freedom journey by really,
it came down to, for me, it came down to this one ingredient
that I was coping with.
(20:49):
And Rachel, the thing, one of the things
that really changed my life
that I wanna give the listeners hope for
is after, you can imagine after being overweight and obese,
ending out morbidly obese,
you can imagine how I carried a ton of guilt
and shame about that.
And I felt that this was my fault,
I could never get it right, believe me.
I was a chronic dieter.
(21:12):
Like I was constantly trying to figure it out.
And the dietary advice was failing me over and over again.
For example, like everything in moderation does not work
for someone who has insulin resistance
because it just like, I just want more and more carbs
or more and more sugar.
And there was a reason for that, that it wasn't,
(21:32):
I learned that it wasn't entirely all my fault
because I really did truly have an addiction
to food and sugar physiologically.
There was something going on in my brain.
And so when I heard my, I call him my earthly health hero,
Dr. Jason Fung was the first person I heard talk about this.
(21:52):
He's a nephrologist in Canada.
He was tired of sending his type two,
type two diabetes patients for ortho-called salts
to get their limbs amputated.
And so he wanted to get to the root cause of why,
what's going on with these type two diabetics
and why we just can't get off the sugar and the carbs.
(22:13):
And he looked in the camera in a video
that I was watching one day and he just said,
I just want you to know this is not your fault.
And I got tears in my eyes.
I'm like, what do you mean this is not my fault?
What do you mean my obesity is not my fault?
I've been told I'm lazy.
I've been told I just need to exercise more.
I've been told I just need to eat lettuce and tuna fish.
(22:34):
And none of that stuff worked for me.
But what was going on behind the scenes that I didn't know
was the advice wasn't working for me
because again, I had the insulin resistance.
My insulin hormone was really out of whack
and insulin is your fat storing hormone.
And no dietician, no doctor,
nobody ever talked to me about my insulin hormone,
(22:56):
even in the hospital based program that I was in.
So learning that really set me free.
It allowed me to like release the guilt and shame
of what had been happening to me for 30 years.
And now I, as a believer, I say,
okay, this is not entirely our fault, right?
(23:17):
But now that we have this problem,
it's our responsibility to fix it and to take ownership
and to do something about it.
And so learning what I learned about sugar,
how addictive it is, how it's in all of our factory foods.
I don't eat factory foods anymore, of course,
but it's hyper palatable, super addictive
(23:38):
and it's keeping us hooked.
And we're even hearing things in dietary world
about it's okay to eat some of this stuff in moderation.
Well, what I learned is that the best thing for me
was to eliminate sugar in all forms, sugar grains,
starchy starches, like potatoes, bread, things like that.
(23:58):
As soon as I did that, Rachel, that's when my weight loss,
I call it the weight loss magic for me.
That's when it happened.
Like the weight just started melting off of me
in ways that I never experienced
for all of those 30 years of my dieting efforts.
So living a sugar-free lifestyle has truly set me free
and not just physically,
(24:20):
but I did not realize how much brain fog I was living in.
So it actually cleared my brain fog,
gave me mental clarity, gave me a momentum,
it gave me a renewed zeal for living every single day,
renewed my mind.
And then of course, the spiritual growth
and the spiritual maturity that I experienced
(24:42):
when I set out on this journey is like,
it's very indescribable.
Joy is the best way to describe it.
Right, oh my gosh.
I didn't even know that about insulin.
You've just schooled me on a lot of things here.
Yeah, yeah.
And you don't even think about it because it's like,
you gotta make those small changes,
(25:03):
those small little tweaks.
And I think that is, you know,
somebody who's on this journey that's listening
could be like, I tried all the things, I've done this,
I've done that.
But here's the thing, don't give up.
There is a way.
There's that will and there's a way.
And just like Christine said, she had it,
you know, sometimes it's not up to you to figure it out,
but you're scrolling on social media
(25:24):
and all of a sudden you see this video and you spoke to it.
And so God will lead you to where you need to go.
Yeah, he guided me step by step,
every single step of the way.
I really, truly, I always say when we show up,
God shows up, so I want to like give him the glory
for all of this happening.
But I also believe that small habits build
(25:47):
and deliver big results.
So I don't want anybody to feel overwhelmed.
And I just want everybody listening right now
that needs this hope or needs to grab onto something.
So you think of one small habit shift
that you can implement today.
And then like a week later, I added something else.
And then a week later, I added something else.
(26:08):
I did a slow step by step plan to get aqua sugar.
And that was what really worked well for me.
And that's how I coach women to is step by step.
Yeah, so it wasn't like an overnight,
all of a sudden you just clean out your pantry
and your fridge and you put in like leafy vegetables
and tuna like they say, right?
And that doesn't work.
(26:29):
I don't even eat that many leafy vegetables to be honest.
Like I really don't eat a lot of salads anymore.
I mostly focused on protein in the form of I'll eat
red meat a couple of times a week, fish,
chicken, pork, eggs, things like that.
And then low-carb as well, they do love adding those
into my way of eating as well too.
(26:51):
Yeah, so would you say that your diet primarily consists
of lean meats and veggies per se?
Like you're under-
Yeah, I'm very protein focused,
especially since now I'm post-menopausal.
And I think ladies, it's so important
that we focus on protein and make sure we have that
as we're aging.
And let's see, so example last night I made,
(27:12):
I did have red meat last night, which I had a steak
and I made some lupini beans on the side
and added some mint and some lime juice to it,
things like that, broccoli, asparagus, I love cow flower.
Interestingly enough, I've even loved cow flower as a kid.
So I eat a lot of cow support.
Yeah, and then just always, always,
(27:33):
my first choice is to finish my meat, my protein,
and then add a side just like that.
Yeah, that would be ideal for anyone at this point.
It's like, I always think of it's whole real healthy foods.
It's like, I think it was an author,
he's slipping my name, but Michael Pollock, I think it is.
(27:55):
And he says it's pick, pull, and plop.
Oh, that's fun.
Yeah, so like obviously if you're in a grocery store,
if it wasn't picked, if it wasn't pulled
and it wasn't plopped, and not plucking meaning
just from like chicken, but it's like, it's sustainable
and it's a real byproduct of what is quality,
whole real dense food.
(28:16):
Look at it from a nutritional standpoint.
And so even for those that are shopping wise,
I know for me it was like, I don't even know
how to navigate a grocery store because it's like,
I just went up and down all the aisles
and was like, pick that and do that.
But I realized that this might just be a little bit
off side tangent here, but the way stores are designed
is to lead you through all the foods that aren't good
(28:38):
for you to get to the healthy foods in the back.
Now there's been a shift where like,
I don't know how it is in Michigan where you're at,
but in Ohio, when you go into the grocery stores,
you're right up into like the produce
and the fruits and vegetables section.
So shopping the perimeter of the store will,
those are your real full foods.
Anything in those middle aisles that are in boxes
(28:59):
and cans, moderate sometimes.
Yeah, so that is like one of the first tips I give is to,
first of all, you can cut your grocery shopping time
in half too by just hitting the number perimeter.
I can get in and out of the grocery store at record time
now, so yeah, very few items are needed
in the interior aisles.
Like maybe coffee, tea, lobster, and some condiments,
(29:22):
something like that, but yeah, perimeter is where it's at.
And I love to say, you know, from Gansgood's mortgage board,
these foods, most of the foods that I eat
don't even need an ingredient label.
It's like, A, it's like chicken.
Salmon.
Like salmon, it's like broccoli.
Yeah.
Exactly.
Yeah, and I know some people think like,
(29:43):
well, that just sounds like a lot of deprivation,
but it's not.
I promise you that when you nourish your body well
and you remove the sugars from your life,
I liked to talk about sugar as a fuel for your body
is so inefficient.
And this is why your body, your brain is screaming for it
over and over again.
(30:04):
Like, this is why you have afternoon slumps
because your blood sugar is crashing.
And then you're saying, oh, I better eat something
because they tell me to eat snacks all day long, right?
And so then your blood sugar is going up and down
all day long.
And it's a very inefficient way to fuel your body
when you think about it.
Like you just have to keep eating more.
But when I eliminated the sugar from my lifestyle,
(30:25):
now I wanted to tap into the fat for fuel.
And isn't that what most women want an idea?
We want to tap into the fat for fuel.
And so I live a very low carb lifestyle.
Of course, my most efficient fuel is the fat on my body,
ketones.
My body will automatically make ketones for fuel.
And not having those sugar crashes all day, every day
(30:50):
is just provided so much more energy.
Because like I said, when I was obese,
all I wanted to do at 2 o'clock in the afternoon
was crawl back into bed and take a nap.
And I don't feel like that ever anymore.
I just have energy to sustain me through the day.
Right.
And that's what nutrition does for you.
It fuels you and gives you that vitality.
(31:13):
So it's like you're getting fueled in yours
from the inside.
And the vitality is penetrating through the physical.
And now you're just like walking around like, man,
I'm just confident.
I'm courageous.
Like all these things that you never thought were possible.
But that's who you were this whole time.
And it was hidden behind these masks and personas and things
(31:33):
that we believe about ourselves.
But that's really not who we are.
Because we're not just our bodies.
We're not this shell.
I truly believe that we are spiritual beings
living a human existence.
And this is just the vessel that we
are given to fulfill that mission and purpose.
Right.
And as believers, we're called to treat this vessel well.
(31:53):
Our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit.
And so we allow that to do its work in our lives.
And man, that was man's for me for decades,
for each of the decades.
Yeah, I can imagine.
Because that was me too.
I feel like my journey, I would say,
really started about 10 years ago
is when I just said, I've had enough.
(32:13):
I've had enough of just living this way, this lifestyle.
It felt so fake.
And I couldn't sustain it because the authentic me
that I didn't even know until years later.
But it feels like just yesterday.
Because this newness of life, you've lived decades.
But one decade feels like a couple of years.
(32:35):
And so this whole new vitality, that's a big thing.
You can definitely resonate.
And so you talk about building confidence
and creating that lasting change.
Is this what you teach in your book
and some of the habits and lifestyle changes?
Yes, yes.
Because I just want women to step up into their purpose
and do it confidently.
(32:56):
And you mentioned courageously.
I love courage.
I never had courage before.
And being on this journey of renewing,
like restoring my physical health and renewing my mind,
it just ushered in such a level of confidence and courage
that I thought was very odd.
You know, for me, I always thought I was an introvert.
(33:20):
And I still believe that I do have very introverted
tendencies.
However, I have things to say now.
And I'm not afraid to say them.
And the Lord has gifted me with this confidence now.
I know that he made me resilient.
And I saw that throughout my entire life.
And I know he made me with grit.
(33:42):
I love to say I help women do hard things.
I've always done that.
Even if it was just one on one sitting with a friend
and helping them through a difficult situation
or helping my best friends in their calculus class
in high school, it's just always been my calling
to help women do hard things.
And I could never understand.
(34:03):
I always consider myself a high achiever.
Why could I not get this weight loss thing right?
I could do everything else right.
I had a career that I loved.
I was in corporate America as a corporate controller,
left after 32 years to pursue this writing and speaking
and coaching lives.
But it was always the thing that was very unsettled in my life.
(34:27):
Like, I have a great career.
My kids are healthy and thriving.
Why can't I get this correct?
And I think it was just I was coping so much
that the confidence and the courage
were just layered underneath what I was coping with.
Food was just doling every aspect of my life.
(34:47):
Not only was I doling my emotions by coping with food
and samsing my cravings with food,
high in carbohydrates and high in sugar,
things that were hyperpalatable,
but it was just really doling everything about my life.
And all those years, I never truly
had an understanding of what joy really means.
(35:09):
And I call it biblical joy now.
But now it means, despite any circumstance
that we are living through, despite whatever heavy weight
we're carrying, and that can be the heavy weight of obesity.
It could be the heavy weight of financial ruin.
It could be the heavy weight of living in grief
that you didn't expect.
If we dig deeper, like you encourage your listeners
(35:32):
to do all the time and really just cling to that courage
and the confidence that we've all got innately.
I believe we all have some level of that innately.
And just really reach down for that
and step out onto this hard journey.
And again, like I always say, when you show up,
if you want to show up to this hard journey,
I really truly believe that God will show off
(35:53):
in what these heavy circumstances are
that He can bring you through.
Wow.
Yeah, and it's wonderful to know how amazing life
is when you begin a new life again.
Really?
Yes.
Wow.
Yeah, even at 50 years old, ladies.
Yeah.
When was mine?
(36:14):
35?
Yeah.
Amazing.
Yeah.
Yeah, I have quite a few coaching clients
that are in your age range.
And it just fills my heart with even greater joy
that they're getting this at a younger age than I did.
I don't regret the decades that I lived there,
(36:34):
because I know it's part of my story.
And I had to experience that so that I could appreciate
and be grateful for what I have gone through
and what God has delivered me into in this new freedom.
Right.
And if you look back, it's like, OK, so here you say,
you lived these decades, and you don't regret it.
And your mission now has been to empower
(36:57):
these women, the younger, the better.
Because if you can shorten that learning curve
and avoid the same pitfalls and mistakes that both Christine
and I made, it's like, this is why we do what we do.
And you don't regret that time.
Yes, it sucks for you to have it to experience.
But look at the deepening of your faith
in this vast well of experience and compassion and empathy
(37:20):
and understanding and knowing that, because you've
walked it for so long.
So I wouldn't say that even in my part, in my story.
I don't discount any of that stuff.
And my book is literally a vulnerable share.
It's a living testament and testimony
to what is possible when we let go and surrender
and want to transform your life from the inside out.
(37:42):
Because with God, everything is possible.
And that is where I think that we both agree,
it's just like, this is the pivotal thing that has really
transformed our life.
Because it wasn't about us.
We didn't.
But he helped find the way for us.
And that's the testimony that we get to pass on and carry
(38:04):
forward into the works that we do.
And the irony of this, and I probably
share this in many of the episodes sprinkled out
throughout all the years.
But we have this platform, The Confident Woman.
I was not confident.
I had zero confidence.
I was the girl who was just like,
just turn the lights out and shut the door
(38:25):
and pretend I don't exist because nobody will notice me
anyway.
And I faced that way.
Because there was so much shame and so much guilt
that I just wanted to hide behind
that I was a social introvert, awkward social anxiety,
things like that, where I never could have imagined
me writing a book.
So when God told me, you're going to write a book,
I said, you got the wrong person here.
(38:45):
And fast forward when you start surrendering,
the how and trusting in the why.
Or surrender, yeah, either way, something like that.
It's like you're surrendering to the process.
And that's where the transformation happens.
And I remember this witnessing your story as well.
Oh my gosh, this is a new version of me.
Every time there's this new layer that's peeled off
(39:05):
and this new beginning, this new creation, this newness,
that that was me walking in this confidence of like,
how this is possible?
And I remember thinking, I want every woman to feel this.
But I didn't know what this was.
And that was confidence because that was something
I admired in other women because I thought
(39:26):
that that was a gift that I was not gifted.
And there was a bit of some sort of like resentment,
like why do they got it and I don't?
Yeah, and so here's this platform now
that brings women from all walks, all stories,
all over the world, sharing just stories of transformation,
of growth, of hope, of change, of empowerment,
(39:47):
of inspiration.
And Christine, I'm enthralled by your story.
This is just so profound.
And I love that your journey, similar yet different,
I find so many nuggets to take away in your story as well.
Yeah, thank you.
I love that we both have, our story began about 10 years ago
because it was now we're in 2025,
(40:08):
that sitting on the side of the mountain
happened for me in September of 2015.
Really?
Yeah, it's like I'm coming up on the 10 year anniversary
of that and I'm coming up on the seven year.
And hey, the day we're recording,
January 8th is the seven year anniversary
of me getting to a healthy weight.
So you can see it didn't happen overnight, listeners.
(40:31):
It did not happen overnight.
It was a process.
It was a, you know, there was a progression to it.
But once I like fully surrendered,
you talked about surrender.
Once I fully surrendered this struggle in my life to Jesus
and show up, I show up every day.
Every day I do the surrender.
I have the same process every single morning.
(40:53):
I call it my Bible and beans time.
It's protected.
Nothing can interrupt that time.
And I literally surrender my food, my fasting hours,
my feelings, my fitness, and I do it all by faith.
Those are actually the five pillars
of my coaching methodology.
But that's always, it's like focusing on those things
and the women that I coach when we focus on those things,
(41:16):
it encompasses so much, right?
That is really where the freedom comes in.
And that's really how we can step into it day by day,
step by step, showing up just the daily surrender,
the daily surrender.
And another thing I love to encourage women as well is,
like I mentioned, I love to help women do hard things.
(41:36):
And ladies, you are capable of doing hard things.
Step into it confidently.
And it's okay if it feels uncomfortable.
We have to be comfortable with being uncomfortable.
For any type of transformation that happened in our life.
Yes, absolutely, absolutely.
And so of course, how can, first,
how can people find your book and buy your book,
(41:58):
and then suddenly, how can they connect with you
after they gotten in your space?
And it was like, oh my gosh, I gotta talk to Christine.
Yes, okay, so the book, Sugar Freed,
is available on Amazon.
And I also do have a whole webpage on my website
dedicated to the book.
So they go to Christine Trimp on the manual,
they'll see a weight loss and you can see things
about my program, you can see about the book.
(42:21):
And I also have a free gift for your listeners as well too.
There is a chapter excerpt of my book available.
And I think you'll put the link in the show notes for that.
Or they can just go to sugarfreedgift.com.
Don't forget to put the D on the end of sugarfree.
So sugarfreed.com.
(42:41):
I'm sorry, gift.com.
Love it.
So of course, those links are in the show notes.
Yeah, I'm sorry, and I'm all over social media.
Just look for me by my name.
Awesome, yes, so incredible because this book
is going to not only change your life,
Christine is a living testimony of what is possible.
(43:03):
So if you are sugar freed and wanting to be,
and yeah, addiction, and you're just like,
how do I break this cycle?
Check out the book, show notes, click the link,
and definitely read it and connect with Christine.
And if this episode resonates with you,
reach out to her as well.
This is what we do.
This is why we pour our hearts and souls
(43:24):
into the works that we do is to provoke life change
in ourselves and gift it to you guys as well.
So thank you.
Thank you, Christine, for being my guest here today.
This has been incredible.
And I'm just grateful for this conversation.
Thank you, Rachel.
It was really delightful to be with you today.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you so much for joining me on today's episode
(43:44):
of the Confident Woman podcast.
If you enjoyed today's episode as much as I did,
please be sure to like, subscribe and leave us a review.
Thanks again for listening.
Hey there and welcome to the Confident Woman podcast.
(00:06):
I'm your host Rachel Brooks.
Join me as I sit down and chat with co-hosts, friends, and carefully curated guests and
talk about all the things that empower you to become your best and most confident self.
So let's get started.
All right ladies, welcome back.
Today we have with us Christine Trimp.
Christine is a transformative wellness leader dedicated to empowering professional Christian
(00:30):
women to reclaim their health and vitality through her faith-based holistic approach
to weight loss.
As the founder of the Sugar-Free Me method and a certified sugar licensed practitioner,
Christine helps clients achieve lifelong healing from sugar addiction and food-related struggles.
Her clients experience dramatic transformations including sustained weight loss and breakthroughs
(00:53):
in physical, emotional, and spiritual health with over 80% retention in her programs after
a personal story of losing a hundred pounds, which we...
I'm not even going to finish this bio because I'm about to pass this mic over to Christine
because she's got a beautiful, profound story and I want her to tell this.
So Christine, welcome.
(01:14):
Thank you for having me, Rachel.
I'm completely overjoyed to be here with you today.
Oh my gosh.
Even before we started Here, Recore, we were just talking about our passions and just really
what has been moving in our lives and the works that we do and just these transformational
journeys that we both have been on in similar but yet different paths.
And it has led us back to our same core message is to empower others, right?
(01:38):
So we live and lead from our own place.
And so I'd love for you to unpack some of the story and how you got started into all
the things that you're doing today.
Yeah.
And I love that you brought up empower because that really is one of my greatest passions
is to empower women to quit sugar and claim weight loss victory.
And I say once and forever and to live in this freedom and greater joy.
(02:02):
So I will start with a story where my life completely transformed.
And I'll go back to my childhood a little bit later, but about 10 years ago right now,
I was standing at the foot of a mountain in the beautiful Rocky Mountain National Park.
My husband and I were there on our 25th anniversary trip and he had planned out some trails for
(02:26):
us to travel.
And he said, we went around Bear Lake, if you've ever been there, that's a really flat
trail around there.
And that was like very easy, no exhaustion, nothing like that.
And he said, well, I want to go climb to the Nymph Lake.
And I was like, okay, so we went over to the trail marker and I looked at the trail marker
and it said a half a mile to Nymph Lake.
(02:47):
And I'm like, okay, I can do a half a mile.
But then I looked it up and I was like, oh no, like that trail went straight up.
And my heart kind of sunk a little bit, but I wanted to give it my best effort.
So it started hiking up this trail with my husband and it wasn't very long retail before
I could not go another step further.
I was gasping for air and I just could not continue on that path.
(03:14):
And the reason being is because I was at a very difficult health place in my life.
I was a hundred pounds overweight, classified as morbidly obese at the time, which naturally
left me gasping for that air on the side of a mountain in Rocky Mountain National Park.
So I told my husband to go ahead and go on without me.
(03:36):
I just can't go another step.
And he was like, are you sure?
I'm like, yes, I'm positive.
Just go.
And I wanted to sit by myself for a few minutes on the side of that path.
And I sound the stump and I sat there and just really had a, I call it my take ownership
moment.
I remember thinking that I just can't go on living like this any longer.
(03:59):
Like I'm exhausted.
I'm moody.
I'm crabby.
I'm not enjoying this.
In fact, I did not even enjoy the fact that I had to like walk to the trailhead.
Like I was regretting going to the mountains, if that makes sense, you know, at the time,
because I knew I wasn't going to be able to climb, but I really did want to give it my
(04:20):
best effort.
So I sat there and I remember just saying a little prayer.
God, I just want to feel better.
Like I just want to feel better.
I want to stop feeling sick and tired all the time.
And at that point in my life, being obese for 30 years, I never expected to lose weight.
I thought I was meant to be fat forever.
And so my prayer wasn't Lord help me lose this weight.
(04:42):
My prayer was, I just want to feel better.
And something really shifted in my life at that moment, sitting by myself on the side
of the path.
I decided to go home from that trip.
I had a new resolve in my heart.
And so I did go home.
I did take ownership.
I did schedule a doctor's appointment that I'd been putting off for many, many years.
(05:03):
The first medical intervention I did was a sleep study.
And that really just started me down the path of this transformation story that took me
from being a woman that can't climb mountains to now being a certified Christian health
and wellness coach and encouraging other women to show up at the foot of that mountain and
(05:24):
let's do the climb together.
So that's where I'm at and I am excited to be here to share all of this with your audience
today.
Wow.
What a beautiful story.
And you know, it's like it's found in the everyday moments.
Those you got to throw whispers, right?
Oh my goodness.
I'm, I'm, I'm over here like jotting down these notes and I'm thinking, gosh, how many
(05:45):
of us women are just journeying this life and there's just a standing point in our life
where just we can't go on anymore.
We can't do this.
Yeah.
And I think how many times has this happened?
It's just like brought us to our knees in like a prayer moment or something that buckles
where we're just that last ditch effort.
And sometimes that's where we find God or maybe where we are finally aware that God
(06:08):
had been there and we meet God.
Yes.
Yes.
And God will meet you anywhere at the foot of the hill of this, this trail.
On your knees crying, you never know.
And it's just these moments that are so life changing.
And I love your story of how profound it is.
And you know, as you're going through and this journey first started with that medical
(06:30):
intervention.
So let's kind of walk us through that journey.
I'm curious to know how this all transpired.
Yeah.
So let me just back up a little bit to my childhood and share that I, because you mentioned
about just praying and the Lord finding me, I was very blessed in that moment that he
did, I feel like he did reach out to me.
(06:52):
That was the huge blessing because I did grow up in a Christian home.
I grew up going to church.
I grew up having been surrounded by Christian friends, but for 30 years, I was very casual
about my faith.
I call it my casual Christian years.
And so I never really invited the Lord into my health journey.
And I never invited him into like, why am I feeling so miserable?
(07:16):
Why do I have so much despair?
It was a very, I'm a very type A person.
I was trying to control all the things.
So in that moment, I always say like what David writes in Psalm 40 about sitting in
the pit, I got it reached down and he lifted me up from that miry pit and he put my feet
on a solid rock and he put a new song in my mouth.
(07:37):
And it has definitely been a journey from coming home from Colorado, coming back to
Michigan, having that sleep study.
The reason I put it off, Rachel, is because I did not want to come home with a CPAP machine.
That just did not sound fun to me.
But I have to tell you that that CPAP machine really changed my life.
I started sleeping better.
(07:58):
And when I started sleeping better, I started waking up more refreshed.
I felt a little bit of my brain fog went away and waking up refreshed.
I started the thing that really changed my life more than any dietary choice that I made.
I started picking up my Bible.
First thing in my life, first time in my life.
And I do it, I haven't set it down since because I'm waking up without an alarm now and feeling
(08:23):
refreshed and I thought, what's a girl to do to kill two hours before she has to be
in the corporate office?
That's why I started implementing that into my life.
And then I just started going down a rabbit hole of trying to figure out why my health
issues were compounding.
I had a start to sleep apnea.
Shortly after that Colorado trip, I came home and my painful ovarian cysts were flaring
(08:46):
up again.
So I had an ultrasound.
And then I was diagnosed with fatty liver disease.
And I already knew I was pre-diabetic and I already had daily headaches and I already
had monthly migraine and pain and inflammation.
Just all this stuff was compounding and I wasn't even 50 years old yet.
I was 48.
So my mortality started flashing before my eyes and just really made me super curious.
(09:10):
Now that I had this refreshed waking up in the morning and I was feeling a little bit
better because I was getting better health or better sleep.
Why were all of these issues compiling?
And why was my liver full of fat?
Set me down a rabbit hole of discovering what I needed to know about the standard American
diet that any diet program I had been in before really didn't address.
(09:34):
And that was that sugar is a major hormone disruptor.
Our diet is loaded with sugar.
Even sugar in moderation was detrimental to my health because being pre-diabetic or anybody
that's dealt with type 2 diabetes has probably heard the term insulin resistance.
And so our insulin hormone is out of whack.
(09:54):
And I learned step by step how to heal my insulin hormone, get it stabilized, get my
blood sugar stabilized, ditched the sugar, switched to whole healthy foods with what
I like to call from God's Good Smartest Board.
And that is really truly step by step is what healed my body, my physical body.
The weight loss was amazing, but more importantly, it helped renew my mind.
(10:18):
It helped me adapt new mindset shifts.
And most importantly, because I started picking up God's first thing every morning, the spiritual
growth and change in my life has been the best part of my story.
Wow.
What a beautiful transformation.
I, it's you're sharing this and I'm thinking, you know, so many relate abilities and I just
(10:44):
pull a few from myself.
It's like, I also grew up Christian, Christian values, went to church, did all the things.
There was God, he was kind of like the genie in the bottle God calling him when you need
him and why, to grant me that wish.
And very similarly to you, when I was going through my own transformational journey from
the other side of the spectrum is like for those listening, I suffered body dysmorphia,
(11:07):
eating disorders, disordered eating, laxatives, extremes diet, like all these things.
And it was just, it was this chase for this perfect life, this perfect body, this perfectness
so I could just finally rest because I'm so tired of living this lifestyle that was not
the way I knew that I was supposed to live.
I felt myself after a devastation in my life, just on my knees crying to God.
(11:32):
And I was just like God, if you are really there that I've learned about you in Bible
school and Sunday school and all these things, if there is a God, show me.
And there was just this overwhelming like peace that came over me.
Something I had it, oh, because when you're in that place of just desperation, despair,
And it's like, maybe that was the first thing.
(11:54):
And so like you, I started picking up my Bible
and turning the pages and asking,
where do you want to leave me today?
And it was just a really cool parallel
to see how both of our stories so uniquely different
has the one thing in common.
God was there this whole time in his presence.
Oh my God.
I just can't tell.
I can't tell.
(12:16):
And he will restore you.
And it's not just the physical, he restores your health.
Your spirit, your soul.
And I love, oh my gosh, I love this.
This is giving me goose bumps.
Yeah, me too.
The relatability there and those that are listening,
it's like, how many times in your life
(12:36):
have you felt so alone?
It felt like there was nobody out there and no help.
Nobody understood what you're going through.
And you just had those breakdowns.
And to know that there is,
faith or not, but there is this higher calling
and purpose for your life.
And I believe that that is for every individual
here on this earth, because of my faith
and because of Christine's as well.
(12:58):
And so as you're continuing this journey,
you're picking up your Bible, you're pouring it out,
life is changing.
What starts to become possible,
the things that you never even knew existed?
Oh my goodness.
Well, first of all,
the book of Ephesians chapter two changed my life.
So let me talk about that because I never thought
that this would be possible.
(13:20):
Rachel, because I used to have like intense sugar cravings,
intense junk food cravings.
And we could talk a little bit later
about why that was happening.
But let me hop into Ephesians two for a second.
I always felt like being morbidly obese,
walking into a room full of women,
being at events, social events, things like that.
(13:42):
I always felt like I never fit in.
And so here I'm starting to pick up my Bible.
And the very first, one of the first books I'd studied
was Ephesians, which I'm so grateful for
because it truly changed my life.
In Ephesians chapter two, Paul actually,
in my NIV version, Paul actually talks about craving
all the wrong things.
And I was like, ooh, that was healthily convicting to me.
(14:04):
And I knew, so I was able to really evaluate
and assess like what was I craving?
Why was I coping with food?
What's going on?
I was able to go a little bit deeper with that.
But then that whole chapter is written
about being made alive in Christ.
And I never felt alive about anything.
(14:24):
I felt like I was just trudging through life,
just getting to the next day.
And my biggest desire day to day
was just to crowd pick into bed
and just go to sleep so that I didn't have to face
another hardship or difficulty or whatever.
But the end of that chapter is talking about
(14:45):
the hope that I had all my life that had been absent
was the seat at the table in the heavenly realms with Jesus.
And that was just really,
it was just such a beautiful picture to me
because all along, I believe I was saved as a child.
I get saved in Bible school when I was a child.
(15:07):
All along I had the seat in the heavenly realms
and I never, I never knew that.
I never really realized that.
So even if I didn't fit in anywhere else,
I physically didn't fit in roller coaster seats.
I almost didn't fit in airplane seats.
And again, I felt very awkward often in social situations.
I had that seat that whole time.
And like here's this table waiting for me the entire time.
(15:32):
And that's really what changed my heart,
gave me a firm perspective on who I am
as a chosen daughter of the King, as a believer,
as someone who I do have, like I honestly,
wow, maybe I do have a purpose in this health journey.
Maybe this is God's way of working and making himself real
(15:55):
and making himself known to me
and making me passionate to pursue him.
So that's something I never really thought about
going into it.
And it was just like a beautiful,
beautiful part of the journey was just seeing
who we are in Christ.
I have a new identity.
Like, and it's hard to think about my old identity.
(16:15):
I call her old Christine the way I used to live
where I didn't feel like I fit in anywhere.
And I love to embrace and I love to encourage women.
If you are like ceiling light, you don't belong anywhere.
You do belong, you know, you do belong.
So 100%.
Yes, I can relate to the 100% of the I am and the identity.
(16:38):
Yes. Yes.
That it's something that I think is so unique
and also part of this journey is so much of our identity
gets wrapped up in who we believe that we are
and who the world tells us we should be.
And then when we look at our situation
and our circumstances, we allow that to define us.
(16:59):
And now when we don't feel that we're accepted
or belonged in certain places, we allow that to define us.
And so all of a sudden that the worth and the value
that we have been gifted and blessed with
has now been discounted and discredited
and we feel worthless and undervalued.
(17:21):
And that not enoughness will lead to that chasteness,
striving to be or achieve something more,
but that's not where it's found.
So I love that you brought up the identity.
And if you could see behind me, I have my little plaque.
I am who he says I am.
It's just a great reminder for anyone
on this identity journey,
(17:42):
when we look at our worth and our value,
I want to prompt you to pause for a moment
and ask how you define yourself
and what you define yourself as,
and then look at who you are
and who you're capable of being,
that potential, that untapped potential
and that greatness that lies
(18:03):
within each and every one of us.
So this journey is with this identity
in this new found spirit in life through Ephesians.
Carry on like that.
I'm enthralled by your story.
I love trying to hear your story.
I can't tell your story.
Right, so now like I've been made alive in Christ.
And for the first time in my life,
(18:24):
approaching the age of 50, I actually feel alive.
I feel like I'm thriving and oh, I froze or you froze.
Am I good now?
Yep, you're good.
Okay, I have it.
Okay, so for the first time in my life approaching age 50,
I suddenly feel like I'm alive, like I'm thriving.
Like I have a purpose.
God has a plan for my life.
(18:45):
And like I don't have to live in just the doldrums
of just exist, just merely existing.
Like I could, I can treat my health and wellness correctly
so that I thrive well.
I can influence my family with health and wellness,
(19:05):
and to help them thrive well.
And not only their physical health,
like with the food and the choices that we make in the home,
but just encouraging them in this joy.
It's such a joy-filled journey it's been.
Like joy is the big gift that I was given.
Weight loss was amazing.
Losing 100 pounds, I feel so much better.
(19:26):
All of my chronic health issues have been reversed
or put into remission.
But really the ultimate gift has been stepping
into this freedom that I'd never experienced in my life
and in the greater joy and loving.
So, yes, there's nothing like it.
That's why I'm here talking to you about it.
Yes, and like you said, the freedom,
(19:48):
the freedom to just live the life that you were intended to
and you felt like a prisoner locked in this body
or this stronghold that you couldn't break.
And eventually it wasn't up to you to break it
with the power of God's transformation
to empower you to break free.
And so I'd love for you to share a little bit more about,
(20:08):
with your book, you have a book coming up that,
or actually it's out now, right?
Yes, January 21st it was out.
Yes, yes, awesome.
And so tell us about the, first of all,
what is the title of the book
and tell us a little bit about the book too.
Okay, so the book is titled Sugar-Free'd.
Sugar-Free'd, so it has a D on the end of sugar-free.
(20:29):
Sugar-Free'd, I made that word up.
Sugar-Free'd, stop losing the weight loss battle,
start gaining the victory.
And it is a book to help women also
and experience this freedom journey by really,
it came down to, for me, it came down to this one ingredient
that I was coping with.
(20:49):
And Rachel, the thing, one of the things
that really changed my life
that I wanna give the listeners hope for
is after, you can imagine after being overweight and obese,
ending out morbidly obese,
you can imagine how I carried a ton of guilt
and shame about that.
And I felt that this was my fault,
I could never get it right, believe me.
I was a chronic dieter.
(21:12):
Like I was constantly trying to figure it out.
And the dietary advice was failing me over and over again.
For example, like everything in moderation does not work
for someone who has insulin resistance
because it just like, I just want more and more carbs
or more and more sugar.
And there was a reason for that, that it wasn't,
(21:32):
I learned that it wasn't entirely all my fault
because I really did truly have an addiction
to food and sugar physiologically.
There was something going on in my brain.
And so when I heard my, I call him my earthly health hero,
Dr. Jason Fung was the first person I heard talk about this.
(21:52):
He's a nephrologist in Canada.
He was tired of sending his type two,
type two diabetes patients for ortho-called salts
to get their limbs amputated.
And so he wanted to get to the root cause of why,
what's going on with these type two diabetics
and why we just can't get off the sugar and the carbs.
(22:13):
And he looked in the camera in a video
that I was watching one day and he just said,
I just want you to know this is not your fault.
And I got tears in my eyes.
I'm like, what do you mean this is not my fault?
What do you mean my obesity is not my fault?
I've been told I'm lazy.
I've been told I just need to exercise more.
I've been told I just need to eat lettuce and tuna fish.
(22:34):
And none of that stuff worked for me.
But what was going on behind the scenes that I didn't know
was the advice wasn't working for me
because again, I had the insulin resistance.
My insulin hormone was really out of whack
and insulin is your fat storing hormone.
And no dietician, no doctor,
nobody ever talked to me about my insulin hormone,
(22:56):
even in the hospital based program that I was in.
So learning that really set me free.
It allowed me to like release the guilt and shame
of what had been happening to me for 30 years.
And now I, as a believer, I say,
okay, this is not entirely our fault, right?
(23:17):
But now that we have this problem,
it's our responsibility to fix it and to take ownership
and to do something about it.
And so learning what I learned about sugar,
how addictive it is, how it's in all of our factory foods.
I don't eat factory foods anymore, of course,
but it's hyper palatable, super addictive
(23:38):
and it's keeping us hooked.
And we're even hearing things in dietary world
about it's okay to eat some of this stuff in moderation.
Well, what I learned is that the best thing for me
was to eliminate sugar in all forms, sugar grains,
starchy starches, like potatoes, bread, things like that.
(23:58):
As soon as I did that, Rachel, that's when my weight loss,
I call it the weight loss magic for me.
That's when it happened.
Like the weight just started melting off of me
in ways that I never experienced
for all of those 30 years of my dieting efforts.
So living a sugar-free lifestyle has truly set me free
and not just physically,
(24:20):
but I did not realize how much brain fog I was living in.
So it actually cleared my brain fog,
gave me mental clarity, gave me a momentum,
it gave me a renewed zeal for living every single day,
renewed my mind.
And then of course, the spiritual growth
and the spiritual maturity that I experienced
(24:42):
when I set out on this journey is like,
it's very indescribable.
Joy is the best way to describe it.
Right, oh my gosh.
I didn't even know that about insulin.
You've just schooled me on a lot of things here.
Yeah, yeah.
And you don't even think about it because it's like,
you gotta make those small changes,
(25:03):
those small little tweaks.
And I think that is, you know,
somebody who's on this journey that's listening
could be like, I tried all the things, I've done this,
I've done that.
But here's the thing, don't give up.
There is a way.
There's that will and there's a way.
And just like Christine said, she had it,
you know, sometimes it's not up to you to figure it out,
but you're scrolling on social media
(25:24):
and all of a sudden you see this video and you spoke to it.
And so God will lead you to where you need to go.
Yeah, he guided me step by step,
every single step of the way.
I really, truly, I always say when we show up,
God shows up, so I want to like give him the glory
for all of this happening.
But I also believe that small habits build
(25:47):
and deliver big results.
So I don't want anybody to feel overwhelmed.
And I just want everybody listening right now
that needs this hope or needs to grab onto something.
So you think of one small habit shift
that you can implement today.
And then like a week later, I added something else.
And then a week later, I added something else.
(26:08):
I did a slow step by step plan to get aqua sugar.
And that was what really worked well for me.
And that's how I coach women to is step by step.
Yeah, so it wasn't like an overnight,
all of a sudden you just clean out your pantry
and your fridge and you put in like leafy vegetables
and tuna like they say, right?
And that doesn't work.
(26:29):
I don't even eat that many leafy vegetables to be honest.
Like I really don't eat a lot of salads anymore.
I mostly focused on protein in the form of I'll eat
red meat a couple of times a week, fish,
chicken, pork, eggs, things like that.
And then low-carb as well, they do love adding those
into my way of eating as well too.
(26:51):
Yeah, so would you say that your diet primarily consists
of lean meats and veggies per se?
Like you're under-
Yeah, I'm very protein focused,
especially since now I'm post-menopausal.
And I think ladies, it's so important
that we focus on protein and make sure we have that
as we're aging.
And let's see, so example last night I made,
(27:12):
I did have red meat last night, which I had a steak
and I made some lupini beans on the side
and added some mint and some lime juice to it,
things like that, broccoli, asparagus, I love cow flower.
Interestingly enough, I've even loved cow flower as a kid.
So I eat a lot of cow support.
Yeah, and then just always, always,
(27:33):
my first choice is to finish my meat, my protein,
and then add a side just like that.
Yeah, that would be ideal for anyone at this point.
It's like, I always think of it's whole real healthy foods.
It's like, I think it was an author,
he's slipping my name, but Michael Pollock, I think it is.
(27:55):
And he says it's pick, pull, and plop.
Oh, that's fun.
Yeah, so like obviously if you're in a grocery store,
if it wasn't picked, if it wasn't pulled
and it wasn't plopped, and not plucking meaning
just from like chicken, but it's like, it's sustainable
and it's a real byproduct of what is quality,
whole real dense food.
(28:16):
Look at it from a nutritional standpoint.
And so even for those that are shopping wise,
I know for me it was like, I don't even know
how to navigate a grocery store because it's like,
I just went up and down all the aisles
and was like, pick that and do that.
But I realized that this might just be a little bit
off side tangent here, but the way stores are designed
is to lead you through all the foods that aren't good
(28:38):
for you to get to the healthy foods in the back.
Now there's been a shift where like,
I don't know how it is in Michigan where you're at,
but in Ohio, when you go into the grocery stores,
you're right up into like the produce
and the fruits and vegetables section.
So shopping the perimeter of the store will,
those are your real full foods.
Anything in those middle aisles that are in boxes
(28:59):
and cans, moderate sometimes.
Yeah, so that is like one of the first tips I give is to,
first of all, you can cut your grocery shopping time
in half too by just hitting the number perimeter.
I can get in and out of the grocery store at record time
now, so yeah, very few items are needed
in the interior aisles.
Like maybe coffee, tea, lobster, and some condiments,
(29:22):
something like that, but yeah, perimeter is where it's at.
And I love to say, you know, from Gansgood's mortgage board,
these foods, most of the foods that I eat
don't even need an ingredient label.
It's like, A, it's like chicken.
Salmon.
Like salmon, it's like broccoli.
Yeah.
Exactly.
Yeah, and I know some people think like,
(29:43):
well, that just sounds like a lot of deprivation,
but it's not.
I promise you that when you nourish your body well
and you remove the sugars from your life,
I liked to talk about sugar as a fuel for your body
is so inefficient.
And this is why your body, your brain is screaming for it
over and over again.
(30:04):
Like, this is why you have afternoon slumps
because your blood sugar is crashing.
And then you're saying, oh, I better eat something
because they tell me to eat snacks all day long, right?
And so then your blood sugar is going up and down
all day long.
And it's a very inefficient way to fuel your body
when you think about it.
Like you just have to keep eating more.
But when I eliminated the sugar from my lifestyle,
(30:25):
now I wanted to tap into the fat for fuel.
And isn't that what most women want an idea?
We want to tap into the fat for fuel.
And so I live a very low carb lifestyle.
Of course, my most efficient fuel is the fat on my body,
ketones.
My body will automatically make ketones for fuel.
And not having those sugar crashes all day, every day
(30:50):
is just provided so much more energy.
Because like I said, when I was obese,
all I wanted to do at 2 o'clock in the afternoon
was crawl back into bed and take a nap.
And I don't feel like that ever anymore.
I just have energy to sustain me through the day.
Right.
And that's what nutrition does for you.
It fuels you and gives you that vitality.
(31:13):
So it's like you're getting fueled in yours
from the inside.
And the vitality is penetrating through the physical.
And now you're just like walking around like, man,
I'm just confident.
I'm courageous.
Like all these things that you never thought were possible.
But that's who you were this whole time.
And it was hidden behind these masks and personas and things
(31:33):
that we believe about ourselves.
But that's really not who we are.
Because we're not just our bodies.
We're not this shell.
I truly believe that we are spiritual beings
living a human existence.
And this is just the vessel that we
are given to fulfill that mission and purpose.
Right.
And as believers, we're called to treat this vessel well.
(31:53):
Our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit.
And so we allow that to do its work in our lives.
And man, that was man's for me for decades,
for each of the decades.
Yeah, I can imagine.
Because that was me too.
I feel like my journey, I would say,
really started about 10 years ago
is when I just said, I've had enough.
(32:13):
I've had enough of just living this way, this lifestyle.
It felt so fake.
And I couldn't sustain it because the authentic me
that I didn't even know until years later.
But it feels like just yesterday.
Because this newness of life, you've lived decades.
But one decade feels like a couple of years.
(32:35):
And so this whole new vitality, that's a big thing.
You can definitely resonate.
And so you talk about building confidence
and creating that lasting change.
Is this what you teach in your book
and some of the habits and lifestyle changes?
Yes, yes.
Because I just want women to step up into their purpose
and do it confidently.
(32:56):
And you mentioned courageously.
I love courage.
I never had courage before.
And being on this journey of renewing,
like restoring my physical health and renewing my mind,
it just ushered in such a level of confidence and courage
that I thought was very odd.
You know, for me, I always thought I was an introvert.
(33:20):
And I still believe that I do have very introverted
tendencies.
However, I have things to say now.
And I'm not afraid to say them.
And the Lord has gifted me with this confidence now.
I know that he made me resilient.
And I saw that throughout my entire life.
And I know he made me with grit.
(33:42):
I love to say I help women do hard things.
I've always done that.
Even if it was just one on one sitting with a friend
and helping them through a difficult situation
or helping my best friends in their calculus class
in high school, it's just always been my calling
to help women do hard things.
And I could never understand.
(34:03):
I always consider myself a high achiever.
Why could I not get this weight loss thing right?
I could do everything else right.
I had a career that I loved.
I was in corporate America as a corporate controller,
left after 32 years to pursue this writing and speaking
and coaching lives.
But it was always the thing that was very unsettled in my life.
(34:27):
Like, I have a great career.
My kids are healthy and thriving.
Why can't I get this correct?
And I think it was just I was coping so much
that the confidence and the courage
were just layered underneath what I was coping with.
Food was just doling every aspect of my life.
(34:47):
Not only was I doling my emotions by coping with food
and samsing my cravings with food,
high in carbohydrates and high in sugar,
things that were hyperpalatable,
but it was just really doling everything about my life.
And all those years, I never truly
had an understanding of what joy really means.
(35:09):
And I call it biblical joy now.
But now it means, despite any circumstance
that we are living through, despite whatever heavy weight
we're carrying, and that can be the heavy weight of obesity.
It could be the heavy weight of financial ruin.
It could be the heavy weight of living in grief
that you didn't expect.
If we dig deeper, like you encourage your listeners
(35:32):
to do all the time and really just cling to that courage
and the confidence that we've all got innately.
I believe we all have some level of that innately.
And just really reach down for that
and step out onto this hard journey.
And again, like I always say, when you show up,
if you want to show up to this hard journey,
I really truly believe that God will show off
(35:53):
in what these heavy circumstances are
that He can bring you through.
Wow.
Yeah, and it's wonderful to know how amazing life
is when you begin a new life again.
Really?
Yes.
Wow.
Yeah, even at 50 years old, ladies.
Yeah.
When was mine?
(36:14):
35?
Yeah.
Amazing.
Yeah.
Yeah, I have quite a few coaching clients
that are in your age range.
And it just fills my heart with even greater joy
that they're getting this at a younger age than I did.
I don't regret the decades that I lived there,
(36:34):
because I know it's part of my story.
And I had to experience that so that I could appreciate
and be grateful for what I have gone through
and what God has delivered me into in this new freedom.
Right.
And if you look back, it's like, OK, so here you say,
you lived these decades, and you don't regret it.
And your mission now has been to empower
(36:57):
these women, the younger, the better.
Because if you can shorten that learning curve
and avoid the same pitfalls and mistakes that both Christine
and I made, it's like, this is why we do what we do.
And you don't regret that time.
Yes, it sucks for you to have it to experience.
But look at the deepening of your faith
in this vast well of experience and compassion and empathy
(37:20):
and understanding and knowing that, because you've
walked it for so long.
So I wouldn't say that even in my part, in my story.
I don't discount any of that stuff.
And my book is literally a vulnerable share.
It's a living testament and testimony
to what is possible when we let go and surrender
and want to transform your life from the inside out.
(37:42):
Because with God, everything is possible.
And that is where I think that we both agree,
it's just like, this is the pivotal thing that has really
transformed our life.
Because it wasn't about us.
We didn't.
But he helped find the way for us.
And that's the testimony that we get to pass on and carry
(38:04):
forward into the works that we do.
And the irony of this, and I probably
share this in many of the episodes sprinkled out
throughout all the years.
But we have this platform, The Confident Woman.
I was not confident.
I had zero confidence.
I was the girl who was just like,
just turn the lights out and shut the door
(38:25):
and pretend I don't exist because nobody will notice me
anyway.
And I faced that way.
Because there was so much shame and so much guilt
that I just wanted to hide behind
that I was a social introvert, awkward social anxiety,
things like that, where I never could have imagined
me writing a book.
So when God told me, you're going to write a book,
I said, you got the wrong person here.
(38:45):
And fast forward when you start surrendering,
the how and trusting in the why.
Or surrender, yeah, either way, something like that.
It's like you're surrendering to the process.
And that's where the transformation happens.
And I remember this witnessing your story as well.
Oh my gosh, this is a new version of me.
Every time there's this new layer that's peeled off
(39:05):
and this new beginning, this new creation, this newness,
that that was me walking in this confidence of like,
how this is possible?
And I remember thinking, I want every woman to feel this.
But I didn't know what this was.
And that was confidence because that was something
I admired in other women because I thought
(39:26):
that that was a gift that I was not gifted.
And there was a bit of some sort of like resentment,
like why do they got it and I don't?
Yeah, and so here's this platform now
that brings women from all walks, all stories,
all over the world, sharing just stories of transformation,
of growth, of hope, of change, of empowerment,
(39:47):
of inspiration.
And Christine, I'm enthralled by your story.
This is just so profound.
And I love that your journey, similar yet different,
I find so many nuggets to take away in your story as well.
Yeah, thank you.
I love that we both have, our story began about 10 years ago
because it was now we're in 2025,
(40:08):
that sitting on the side of the mountain
happened for me in September of 2015.
Really?
Yeah, it's like I'm coming up on the 10 year anniversary
of that and I'm coming up on the seven year.
And hey, the day we're recording,
January 8th is the seven year anniversary
of me getting to a healthy weight.
So you can see it didn't happen overnight, listeners.
(40:31):
It did not happen overnight.
It was a process.
It was a, you know, there was a progression to it.
But once I like fully surrendered,
you talked about surrender.
Once I fully surrendered this struggle in my life to Jesus
and show up, I show up every day.
Every day I do the surrender.
I have the same process every single morning.
(40:53):
I call it my Bible and beans time.
It's protected.
Nothing can interrupt that time.
And I literally surrender my food, my fasting hours,
my feelings, my fitness, and I do it all by faith.
Those are actually the five pillars
of my coaching methodology.
But that's always, it's like focusing on those things
and the women that I coach when we focus on those things,
(41:16):
it encompasses so much, right?
That is really where the freedom comes in.
And that's really how we can step into it day by day,
step by step, showing up just the daily surrender,
the daily surrender.
And another thing I love to encourage women as well is,
like I mentioned, I love to help women do hard things.
(41:36):
And ladies, you are capable of doing hard things.
Step into it confidently.
And it's okay if it feels uncomfortable.
We have to be comfortable with being uncomfortable.
For any type of transformation that happened in our life.
Yes, absolutely, absolutely.
And so of course, how can, first,
how can people find your book and buy your book,
(41:58):
and then suddenly, how can they connect with you
after they gotten in your space?
And it was like, oh my gosh, I gotta talk to Christine.
Yes, okay, so the book, Sugar Freed,
is available on Amazon.
And I also do have a whole webpage on my website
dedicated to the book.
So they go to Christine Trimp on the manual,
they'll see a weight loss and you can see things
about my program, you can see about the book.
(42:21):
And I also have a free gift for your listeners as well too.
There is a chapter excerpt of my book available.
And I think you'll put the link in the show notes for that.
Or they can just go to sugarfreedgift.com.
Don't forget to put the D on the end of sugarfree.
So sugarfreed.com.
(42:41):
I'm sorry, gift.com.
Love it.
So of course, those links are in the show notes.
Yeah, I'm sorry, and I'm all over social media.
Just look for me by my name.
Awesome, yes, so incredible because this book
is going to not only change your life,
Christine is a living testimony of what is possible.
(43:03):
So if you are sugar freed and wanting to be,
and yeah, addiction, and you're just like,
how do I break this cycle?
Check out the book, show notes, click the link,
and definitely read it and connect with Christine.
And if this episode resonates with you,
reach out to her as well.
This is what we do.
This is why we pour our hearts and souls
(43:24):
into the works that we do is to provoke life change
in ourselves and gift it to you guys as well.
So thank you.
Thank you, Christine, for being my guest here today.
This has been incredible.
And I'm just grateful for this conversation.
Thank you, Rachel.
It was really delightful to be with you today.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you so much for joining me on today's episode
(43:44):
of the Confident Woman podcast.
If you enjoyed today's episode as much as I did,
please be sure to like, subscribe and leave us a review.
Thanks again for listening.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!