Goodbye to My Favorite Podcast

My favorite podcast is ending, and it feels like a major loss.

I first started listening to podcasts in 2006 as a college freshman. Every morning in my dorm room, I’d plug my iPod into my Dell laptop and wait while iTunes synced with the device. Podcast options were limited in those days, but I had one or two I enjoyed. Eventually, I found Tsh Oxenreider’s “Simple Mom” podcast (long before I was a mom myself!), and then Joy the Baker launched a podcast network. By the time Serial changed the media landscape forever, I was a podcast evangelist and listening to hours of shows every week.

Fast forward to April 2015. Our family had just relocated from Florida to Michigan, where we knew no one. We had a one-year-old, and I was pregnant. The week after we moved, one of my favorite “mom bloggers,” Meg Tietz, launched a podcast called “Sorta Awesome,” and for almost a decade, it has been truly, very awesome.

I will always remember walking through the frozen food aisle at Meijer, missing my beloved Publix, and listening to Episode 14 of the show. Meg and her cohost were discussing friendship. I stood in front of the dino nuggets and cried because I missed my friends so badly (even more than I missed PubSubs). Listening to their conversation, I felt seen and less crazy and so grateful for an hour of weekly content to make me feel less alone. That was the moment it became my favorite podcast, and it’s remained so for almost a decade.

The other day, I opened up a new note on my phone and started making a list of all the things I’ve learned on Sorta Awesome, all the products, shows, or music I’ve tried. And it’s a lot. 

I credit Sorta Awesome with introducing me to Ted Lasso and Voxer. One episode helped me realize I might have postpartum depression (I did), and another suggested I take omega-3s to help with sensitivity to noise (I do). I credit the hosts with my love of Harry Styles and romance novels. They helped me discover my favorite red lipstick and my go-to cookie recipe. I learned the difference between self-comfort and self-care, and I now wear sunscreen every day. They recommended bullet journaling, stovetop popcorn, Aveeno BB Cream (RIP). I learned to savor the changing seasons and value my female friendships. They encouraged me to honor my body and love what I love without apology.

And so, while it might sound crazy, I really mean it when I say my favorite podcast changed my life.

Podcasting is a strangely intimate medium. To have someone’s voice in my earbuds or over my car speakers for literally hundreds of hours makes them feel weirdly familiar, despite the fact that we’ve never met in person. I’ve laughed and cried and cry-laughed through more than 400 episodes. They became my companions through some of the lowest lows and highest highs of my life. No matter what was going on, I knew I could count on a new episode most Fridays. It’s been one of the most consistent things in my life. 

It reminds me of a quote from my favorite movie, You’ve Got Mail, when Kathleen Kelly writes to Joe Fox, “The odd thing about this form of communication is that you’re more likely to talk about nothing than something. But I just want to say that all this nothing has meant more to me than so many somethings.”

And now, the show is ending.

Is it strange to mourn something like this? Maybe. But the end of my favorite podcast does feel like a very significant loss. I am not the same woman I was when I first hit play, thanks in large part to the content these women created.  I’ll look back on these 400+ episodes with a whole awesome heap of gratitude for all this podcast meant to me and all it brought to my life.

Goodbye, Sorta Awesome. 

Goodbye to my favorite podcast.