Don’t worry, I’m not having a real baby! That factory closed a while ago ☺
[Click here if you want to skip to the 2-question survey on which book title is better!]
My first “baby”
My first “baby” was born in 2009 when Dr. Liz’ Easy Guide to Menopause was published. It was a relatively easy birthing process. I was in a book-writing boot camp, which set me up well to write a strong outline that represented the “5 Steps” that I still do to this day with every patient I work with in my practice.
With this outline in place, I wrote the book in about three weeks. They were pretty intense weeks with many hours of writing in between my days seeing patients in the office. But there it was. A few weeks of boot camp, three weeks of writing, and a first draft was born.
Although many writers refer to their first draft as a “sloppy first copy”, this draft was pretty close to the final product, which I have updated over the years.
Then there was “naming the baby.”
In Las Vegas, at a conference with my dear friend Kim Ruby, nutritionist and mentor, we sat at a table and went back and forth until the full title was created: Dr. Liz’s Easy Guide to Menopause: 5 Simple Steps to Balancing Your Hormones and Feeling Like Yourself Again.
We wanted to capture the idea that feeling better can be “easy” as in not complicated, even though the human body is beautifully complex. The second half of the title is what patients say to me – their own words about what they want. They want to feel balanced, and many of them expressly says, “I just want to feel like myself again.“
Compare this to the book I am working on now. The birthing process has been long and difficult.
My publisher and I came up with what we thought was a really good outline. But when I was done writing all the pieces, following the outline, I realized that what I had was a motley collection of essays rather than a cohesive book.
I will let you in on pieces of the book over the next few weeks and months, in anticipation of the book launch at the end of September.
Naming the New Baby
The original title was: Survival Guide for Menopause: Finally, a Guide for Women AND Men to Survive and Thrive During “The Change”
The current title is Go for G.R.E.A.T.: Dr. Liz’s Guide to Thrive in Your 40’s and 50’s
G.R.E.A.T. is an acronym for a system I use with all of my patients to help them feel great. (I’ll reveal the pieces to you soon, I promise!) I work with people of all ages, so although I mostly care for women in their 40’s and 50’s, I’m already getting feedback about limiting the book title to these two decades, saying I should take out this age range.
The problem is that the hormonal changes I talk about really mostly happen during these two decades!
I absolutely want to write another guide for women in their 20’s and 30’s, another special one for women in their 60’s and better, and maybe even one for teens.
Obviously, hormonal issues affect us at every age. But for now, I see the most suffering among women in their 40’s and 50’s, as their regular doctors perpetuate scary myths about hormone replenishment, and put Band-Aids on their symptoms rather than correct the underlying hormonal imbalances (lots about this in the book).
Last thing: Even though I already knew that most books are bought by women and that women are the primary drivers of health-related information and care, I thought the original book could also address men.
Then I did some research and found some really humorous information in the book reviews online of the books that already exist aimed at men. The funniest comment was on a book written for men about menopause, reviewed by the wife, who said something like, “Great book – I just guess it needs to have a naked woman on the cover in order to get my husband to read it.” Thus pivoting away from aiming the book at men as well as women.