LONDON (BP) -- At 15, American Brittany Viola thought she wasn't good
enough to be one of the top divers in the world because she didn't look
the part.
The young diver had been given an opportunity to train
with Laura Wilkinson, the best diver in Viola's event at the time (and a
former Olympic gold medalist).
"As we trained together, I was
also surrounded by some of the best divers in the world," Viola, now 25,
recalled. "I was only two years into the sport, so I wanted to know how
I could become the best. One of the things that I saw was that these
girls were in really good shape, and I had a little bit of a different
body image than they did."
Viola committed herself to losing
weight and modeling what the other divers looked like. That commitment
led to an eating disorder that plagued her for years until she became a
Christian in college, and God's grace helped her overcome it.
"I've
moved a very long way," said Viola, who will compete Wednesday and
Thursday (Aug. 8-9) in the 10-meter platform diving competition in
London. "It's not something that's completely invisible from my life. It
definitely still remains. It's just not even close to the extremes of
what it used to be. It's something that the Lord keeps pulling me out of
with His truth, and I'm able to move further and further away from it
with Him."
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