So anyone who follows me on social media already knows I’ve been having some issues with the Apple Podcasts entry for BS-Free Witchcraft. For some reason, the main Apple Podcasts page for the show is missing about a full quarter of the episodes. Like there are some random ones missing (like episode twenty-nine), but also like the entirety of July 2022 through February 2024 are just… gone. Even though they’re still in the feed, Apple just doesn’t have them listed anywhere.

And, like, these episodes appear fine on Spotify and Amazon and any platform where you just plop in the RSS feed. It’s only Apple Podcasts where this is happening.

And I’ve gone through everything I can think of to try and fix this. There is nothing within my power to correct this.

Of course I’ve since reached out to Apple’s support (and they assure me they’re looking into it — though who knows how automated that email was), and I’ve created a work around. Using the Nerd & Tie Network backend, I’ve made an alternate Apple Podcasts feed for the show I’m calling the “White Logo” feed (as I’m having it display the old white version of the show’s logo instead of the current green one). Both the White Logo and the classic “Green Logo” pages will get the new episodes, but the White Logo version has the full archives for anyone who wants to use Apple Podcasts to listen to the show.

For some folks this would be satisfactory. Like there’s an alternative route for listeners to get the show, and Apple is working on it. But my brain… it just won’t stop thinking about it.

And this is not helpful. I literally can’t do anything I haven’t already done. Literally everything within my control has been tried. I’ve made sure there aren’t any weird settings in the feed, and that there aren’t any major errors. I’ve tested the feed in multiple podcatchers, and even looked at weird ones online that no one uses and found that they’re working fine. There is literally nothing I can do but wait for Apple Support to fix it, and hope that it gets resolved.

My stupid, obsessive brain just won’t shut up about it though.

It’s so frustrating. Why am I wired like this, where it’s so hard for me to let go of an unsolved problem. I fixate until I find a solution, and when there is no available solution it just stews in there, rattling around.

Ugh.

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