Debbie Lim completed a Graduate Certificate at the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS) and enrolled in a PhD course in psychology at the University of New South Wales. Her work has included editing academic manuscripts.

In 2008 Lim's poem 'Waiting for Trout' won 1st prize in the Inverawe Outdoor Poetry Competition, held at Inverawe Native Gardens, Margate, Tasmania. Also in 2008, Lim was a guest poet at the Sydney Writers' Festival. In 2009 her unpublished poem 'Fossil of Emerging Trilobite' won the Rosemary Dobson Award. Lim lives in Sydney.