Done with Dieting Bonus Episode: Why I Changed the Podcast Name (And Then Changed It Back)

If you've opened your podcast app recently and noticed something different, you're not imagining it. The show has a new name. Well, an old name. Sort of.

In this short bonus episode, I'm pulling back the curtain on what happened when I changed "Done with Dieting" to "Total Health in Midlife" in 2023, why downloads dropped, and why I stayed with a name that wasn't working far longer than I should have. Spoiler: it had nothing to do with the content and everything to do with fear of looking like I couldn't follow through.

Here's what I didn't expect. The story of this name change ended up being a pretty honest mirror of the exact thing I help women work through every day. Staying stuck in something that isn't working because changing it feels like admitting something about yourself. Sound familiar?

This one is short, honest, and worth the ten minutes.

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN

• Why a podcast name change in 2023 caused downloads to drop significantly, and what that revealed about how women actually search for help
• How deferring to someone else's framework over your own gut instinct plays out in business AND in your health
• Why the word "midlife" was quietly turning away the exact women this show was built for

The Listener Takeaway: Why This Episode Matters

This episode is really about one thing: what happens when you outsource your own judgment because you're afraid of what it says about you if you change course. I did it with a podcast name. You may be doing it with your health, following a plan someone else designed, staying in a program that stopped working, not because it's right for you but because quitting feels like failure.

The show is back to "Done with Dieting: Total Health for Women 40+." The content hasn't changed. The approach hasn't changed. But the door is wider now, and if you know a woman who is exhausted by the start-over cycle and ready for something different, she can find it a lot more easily.

RESOURCES

• Take the Free Quiz
• Follow the show: Done with Dieting: Total Health for Women 40+ on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube

RELATED EPISODES YOU MIGHT LOVE

• Episode 179: Midlife Weight Gain: Myths & Facts — If the name "Done with Dieting" caught your attention because you're tired of the same old weight loss advice, this episode breaks down exactly why what worked in your 30s isn't working now, and what actually does.
• Episode 172: The Paradox of Body Acceptance — This episode goes deeper into the tension between wanting to lose weight and learning to work with your body instead of against it, which is exactly the philosophy behind why this show exists.
• Episode 218: How to Get Back on Track — If you've been in the start-over cycle and you're ready to understand why it keeps happening, this one is the logical next listen after this bonus episode.

If you’re a woman in midlife who wants better health without obsessing over weight, you’re in the right place. I’m Elizabeth Sherman, a life and health coach and host of the Total Health in Midlife Podcast.

After coaching hundreds of women, I know the real problem usually isn’t “not enough information” – it’s too much of it, and not knowing where to start. With close to 300 episodes, this show can feel that way too.

To make it easy, I created a free Listener’s Roadmap that helps you figure out which episodes are right for you right now. Tell me what you’re struggling with – low energy, emotional eating, stress, sleep, exercise, or all of the above – and I’ll point you to a curated path of episodes and resources to get you moving.

Download your free roadmap at https://elizabethsherman.com/roadmap.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Welcome to the Done with Dieting Total Health for Women Over 40 podcast, the podcast for women who are done with the startover cycle and ready for a way of taking care of themselves that actually works. Hey everyone, welcome to Done with Dieting, Total Health for Women Over 40. I am your host, Elizabeth Sherman, and I am so glad that you are here with me today. So I want to talk to you about something a little different today. No guests, no teaching, no framework, just me telling you what's been going on behind the scenes, and you may have guessed it already. If you've opened up your podcast app recently and noticed that the show looks a little bit different, you are not imagining it. The name has changed. And if you've been listening for a while, you might recognize the new name because it's actually kind of like the old name, sort of. I'll explain all of that in just a minute. But here's why I wanted to make a whole episode out of this instead of just quietly swapping the name and hoping that everyone would notice and just move on. The story of why I changed the name in the first place and why I'm changing it back is actually really relevant to the work that I do here in the podcast because it's a story about deferring to someone else's opinion over your own gut, staying stuck in something that isn't working because you are afraid of what it says about you if you change course and what happens when you finally just decide to trust your gut and do what you already know. Does that sound familiar? I think it might. So pull up a chair. This episode is going to be short, but it's going to be completely honest. And I think that by the end of it, you are going to see a little bit of yourself in my very unglamorous story about my podcast. So I started this podcast in 2020. And honestly, I still can't believe that I haven't run out of things to say. The reason I started it was actually very practical. I would finish a coaching session with a client and realize that there was more that I wanted her to sit with between our calls. There was more information than we could cover in the time that we had together. So I would send her a podcast episode from one of my mentors, an episode that I really enjoyed. And it worked until one of my clients actually bought something that my mentor was selling and quit working with me. And that's when I understood that my clients needed to hear my voice, not someone else's. And I was terrified that I would have nothing to say. I genuinely thought that I would burn through every idea I had in the first 20 episodes and then just, I don't know, run out of almost 300 episodes later, and that still has not happened. And I always come up with new episode ideas. What has happened is that the show has grown as I have grown. And the way that I thought about women's health when I started in 2020 is pretty different from how I think about it today. I have learned a lot. My advanced certification in feminist coaching was a huge part of that because I started to understand just how much damage diet culture does to women. And I didn't want to feed that machine anymore. So in 2023, I changed the name from Done with Dieting, which is what my original podcast name was, to Total Health in Midlife. And the idea was that the name would reflect where the work had actually gone. Now, I don't hand anyone a meal plan or a workout protocol. I help women figure out what's actually driving their behavior around food and movement and weight loss, if it happens, is tends to be a byproduct of that work, not the goal. And the name was meant to say all of that. It did not do that. Here's what happened after I changed the name. My episode downloads completely dropped, like dropped off a cliff. Not just a little bit, but significantly. And nothing else had changed. The content was exactly the same. My approach was exactly the same. I was exactly the same. It was just the name that was different. And I have spent a lot of time thinking about why I made that call in the first place. And I have to be honest with you about it. I was working with a business coach at the time who believed I should position completely away from weight loss. And her read was that women needed to move away from that goal entirely. And that my content should reflect that. If I really was a feminist coach. And I let that influence me more than I think it should have. Because here's the thing the women who find this show want to lose weight. That is real. And I'm not going to pretend anything different. What I offer is a very different path to get there than anything that they have tried before. And so we're not counting calories or cutting carbs. We're actually looking at what's driving our behavior, what's happening emotionally, and what conditions are set up in their real life and what their body is actually asking for. And that is different than what any other application or tool or diet or program can teach you. I am unique in that respect. Weight loss can happen through this process. It does happen a lot, but I outsourced my own judgment about my audience to someone else's framework and ideas. And the name change reflected her read, not mine. And I'm not going to say that Total Health in Midlife isn't part of who I am, which is why I kept that piece as the subtitle. I stayed with it for way longer than I should have. I knew a long time ago that the name change was the problem. But changing it back felt like admitting that I couldn't commit to a decision. I was afraid of looking flaky, afraid of what you would think of me. So I kept the name that wasn't working because I didn't want to look like someone who couldn't follow through. And if that sounds familiar, it probably should, because it's exactly what we do with our health all the time. So what actually went wrong with total health in midlife? Well, I think that there are two things. The first is that done with dieting was doing something that I didn't fully appreciate until it was gone. It was functioning as a search term. Women who were exhausted by the start over cycle and fed up with plans that worked for two weeks and then didn't were ready for something different. They were typing their search terms into the podcast application and done with dieting would pop up, and that's exactly how they felt. The name met them right where they were. It doesn't make anyone feel seen. The second thing is the word midlife. Now, a lot of women in their 40s hear that word and think, yeah, that's not me. Even though by 40 is the definition of the middle of our life. The women who were the best fit for the show were skipping right past it because they didn't see themselves in the name. So the women who needed it most couldn't find it. And the ones who did find it weren't sure if it was for them. Now, before I made any decisions, I actually took it to you. I went to my social media followers and I put it out there. I explained what I had observed, what I thought was happening, and I told them what I was thinking and asked what they thought. And then I waited. Now here's the thing 95% of the people who responded to my poll resoundingly said, change it back to done with dieting. And actually, I think that there was literally one person who said that I should keep total health and midlife. Only one. And my first reaction, I'll be honest, was not relief. It was quite honestly irritation. It was like, why didn't anyone tell me when I changed it in 2023 that they didn't like it? I'm joking, kind of. Not really. But it did matter to me that I asked and that so many of you weighed in. This show exists because of the women who listen to it, who share it, and who keep coming back. So when I'm making a decision that affects what it's called and how easy it is to find, of course, your input belongs in that conversation. And so I am glad that I asked and I am glad that you answered. So here's what the new name is actually doing. Done with dieting leads how you already feel. You're tired of starting over. You're tired of plans that work until they don't. You're not looking for another diet. That's the emotional state this show was built for. And the name says it out loud. Now, total health for women over 40 signals that the show has grown. We're not just talking about food. We're not talking about restriction. We're talking about sleep, stress, hormones, movement, how you think about your body, what's driving your behavior, and all of it. And women over 40 names the audience clearly without using a word that a lot of women in their 40s aren't ready to claim just yet. One more thing that made me laugh when I realized it. My Apple Podcast URL has always been done with dieting podcasts. The infrastructure has never changed. I just changed the name on top of it. So, in a very literal sense, we are just catching up to what was already there. Now, the show is not changing. The content is not changing. I am not changing. We just have a new old converged name. Same episodes, same topics, and same approach. Now, what I do need from you is this. If the show is already in your feed, please make sure that you're following it under the new name so nothing gets interrupted. You shouldn't have to do anything. And if you've been listening for a while and you haven't left a review yet, I would love for you to do that. Now is a great time. Reviews help other women find the show. And that's the whole point of this name change. Getting this information that I share in front of the women who need it most. And if you know someone who is tired of starting over, tired of plans that don't stick, tired of feeling like her body is the problem, I want to invite you to send her this show. The name now says exactly what it is. Please help her find it. That's all I have for you today. Have an amazing day, and I will talk to you next time. Bye-bye. Thank you for joining us on today's episode. If you're feeling overwhelmed by all the health advice out there and looking for something that's straightforward, my eight basic habits that help you people do guide and checklist is just what you need. It breaks down essential habits into simple, equitable steps that you already know how to do. By following these habits, you'll set yourself on a path to better health, surpassing most people that you know. To get your free copy, just click the link in the show notes or go to elisabethsherman.com slash habits. It's an easy start, but it could make all the difference in your health journey. Grab your guide today and take the first step towards a healthier youth.