As she took the mic in Marion, Iowa, on the Sunday after Thanksgiving, Warren told the audience they were in for a little "experiment." She would be giving a Reader's Digest version of her stump speech, cutting it down to just a few minutes, before opening up the room for a more intimate and robust version of her typical question-and-answer sessions. A day later, during a visit to Iowa City, she did the same.

After a summer surge vaulted Warren into the top tier of the Democratic presidential primary and, by mid-October, placed her atop a handful of early-voting state polls, the Massachusetts senator has entered the campaign's wintry dog days on the back foot. South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg has seized the lead in Iowa and a recent national survey from Quinnipiac , which also saw Buttigieg on the up, showed that he was syphoning support primarily from one candidate: Warren.

Despite the setbacks, and at least a couple days playing around with her town hall rundown, the campaign has shown no signs of making any wholesale break from its long-standing strategy. But, as seen over 48 hours in Iowa, there has been a move to open her up a bit to voters -- in the flesh and through a recent uptick in national media engagement.

On Wednesday, she was in New York City for a hat trick of media appearances -- including "The Tonight Show" with Jimmy Fallon, Lawrence O'Donnell's MSNBC program, and a sitdown with Bloomberg TV's Joe Weisenthal. Those spots followed a recent viral visit with Showtime's Desus and Mero. (Her problem-solving skills proved useful as the trio "escaped" a haunted submarine.)

A campaign aide also told CNN that Warren's husband, Bruce Mann, the mostly media-shy Harvard professor, will soon begin stumping for her on his own. His first stop will come next week in New Hampshire.

On that Sunday night in Iowa, Warren ended up taking a dozen questions from the crowd. At one point, the politics of the day took a backseat to something much different.

A young woman, anxious about the prospect of coming out as LGBT to her extended family, asked if "there was ever a time in your life where somebody you really looked up to maybe didn't accept you as much?" -- and how Warren "dealt" with it.

The candidate locked eyes with the teen and, in raw terms she rarely discusses in public, spoke about the end of her first marriage , when she was in her early 20s, and the pain of delivering the news to her mother.

"She wanted me to marry well and I really tried, and it just didn't work out," Warren said, her voice breaking. "And there came a day when I had to call her and say, 'This is over. I can't make it work.' And I heard the disappointment in her voice. I knew how she felt about it. But I also knew it was the right thing to do."

Afterward, Warren and Raelyn, a high school senior, embraced. In that very public, yet personal moment, Warren had been whispering in her ear, "We've got it. We're going to be OK. You're going to get through this. You're going to be good."

Dealing with Medicare for All

In Marion, most of the audience's queries, though, had followed a more conventional script, hitting on topics from impeachment to, of course, "Medicare for All." One apparently skeptical voter mixed some advice into a question about Warren's health care plan.

"Is (Medicare for All) going to be an option for people, or is it not?," she asked, before adding: "I kind of feel like you would get more people on your side if it was an option."

Warren took the question, and her time -- "I know it's wonky but hang in here with me for a minute," she began -- in spelling out the details of her two-step plan.

It was a snippet of the ongoing debate over single-payer health insurance, which over the past months, has further escalated and become more complicated as industry interests and moderate Democratic candidates ramp up their own campaign against it. The issue has bedeviled Warren, who famously pledged her support at the first debate in Miami, but only got pressed with the usual, stickier questions -- about funding and the transition -- after she shot up in the polls.

During the October debate in Ohio, Warren was hammered by moderates like Buttigieg, former Vice President Joe Biden and Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar for refusing to offer more details on Medicare for All. The candidate with a "plan" for everything wouldn't, on stage or in the days afterward, go much beyond her key talking point -- that the middle class costs would go down -- when asked for more specifics.

When she eventually gave in to the pressure, releasing a financing plan in November, the same critics who had spent weeks demanding details laughed off her cost estimate as unfeasibly low and painted the new funding mechanism, which didn't include a payroll tax, as a cynical political document.

A few weeks later, after previously suggesting she didn't see "any reason" to change the transition plan offered in Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders' Medicare for All legislation, Warren did just that -- and effectively breaking up the bill into two pieces, a step that angered and, more often, confused some single-payer advocates.

Sanders never publicly criticized Warren's decision, but he did -- hours after she made her new plan public -- announce during a visit to California where he accepted the endorsement of National Nurses United, the passionately pro-Medicare for All union, that he would introduce his bill -- the whole thing -- "during the first week of our presidency."

Wendell Potter, the former health insurance executive who now leads a group called "Medicare For All Now," said that some of the backlash from the left, and any broader sense that Warren was backing off her support, might have been mitigated if Warren's team had communicated more clearly with pro-Medicare for All groups, including those -- like the nurses -- that either don't support her campaign or remain uncommitted.

"These folks have been in this effort for many, many years," Potter said. "Some of them were just perplexed. They didn't know, I guess, in advance what she was doing on this transition plan and (when that happens), you read more into it than would've been the case had there been maybe more communications with the advocacy organizations."

Undecided in Iowa

But even if her Medicare for All positioning has frustrated some, or depleted trust among diehard progressives, the more imminent threat to Warren's ambitions comes from her right, in the form of Buttigieg. This past weekend in Iowa, more than a dozen voters -- all at Warren events -- told CNN that they were undecided ahead of the caucuses. Some mentioned Biden, but nearly all of the uncommitted attendees suggested Buttigieg and Warren were their favorites. The same dynamic became clear in recent interviews voters in New Hampshire and even South Carolina, where a number of potential Buttigieg supporters also said they were considering Warren.

Before an event in Waterloo on Saturday, Chris Murphy, who made the short drive down from Cedar Falls, said she had been "impressed with Elizabeth from the get-go, because I kind of identify with her story as far as being a university professor and doing what she felt is right." But the 67-year-old also named Buttigieg, who, despite concerns about his electability, "makes a lot of common sense and he has a message that resonates with me."

The decision, Murphy said, would come down to two issues at the center of debate right now in Iowa and around the country: health care and higher education. And, despite her affection for the candidate, Warren's more ambitious positions were giving her pause.

"I know she has changed (her Medicare for All plan) recently, which some people say there's a flip-flop, but if she has re-evaluated things, that's good because people need to reevaluate all the time," Murphy said, expressing some doubt over Warren's ability to push her plans through Congress. "So if she moves more to the center on health care and the free education too -- it's too extreme, the free college tuition. We don't need it 'for all.' We need to get it on a graduated scale according to income."

Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Elizabeth Warren, a US senator from Massachusetts, speaks during a campaign event in March 2019. Hide Caption 1 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren is held by her father, Donald Herring, soon after she was born in Oklahoma City in 1949. "My daddy worked hard his whole life," Warren said when she posted this picture to Facebook on Father's Day 2014. "He sold fencing and carpeting, and ended up as a maintenance man. He and my mother never had much, but he said that his life was a success because his four kids had more opportunities than he had." Hide Caption 2 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren A young Warren sits with her mother, Pauline. "When I was 12, my daddy had a heart attack," Warren wrote on Facebook in 2017. "All three of my brothers were off in the military, and Daddy was out of work for a long time. We lost our family station wagon, and we were about an inch away from losing our home. One day, I walked into my mother's room and found her crying. She said, 'We are not going to lose this house.' She wiped her eyes, blew her nose, and pulled on her best dress -- the one she wore to funerals and graduations. At 50 years old, she walked down the street and got her first paying job: answering the phones at Sears. That minimum wage job saved our home, and my mother saved our family." Hide Caption 3 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren poses for a Christmas photo with her brother John. All three of her brothers served in the military. Hide Caption 4 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren In the late 1960s, Warren attended George Washington University on a debate scholarship. She dropped out after two years to get married, but she graduated from the University of Houston in 1970. Hide Caption 5 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren holds her newborn daughter, Amelia, in 1971. She and her first husband, Jim Warren, had two children before divorcing in 1980. Hide Caption 6 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren with her three brothers -- Don, John and David -- in 1980. After graduating from college, Warren worked as a speech pathologist at a New Jersey elementary school. She then got a law degree and taught at the Rutgers School of Law before becoming a professor at the University of Houston Law Center. She's also been a professor at the University of Texas Law School, the University of Pennsylvania Law School and Harvard Law School. Hide Caption 7 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren and her second husband, Bruce Mann. She posted this old photo to Facebook in 2016 along with a story about how she proposed to him. They were married in 1980. Hide Caption 8 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren teaches at the University of Pennsylvania Law School in the early 1990s. Hide Caption 9 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren US Sen. Barack Obama listens to Warren speak during a roundtable discussion about predatory lending in 2008. Warren is an expert on bankruptcy law and was an adviser to the National Bankruptcy Review Commission in the 1990s. In 1989, Warren co-authored the book "As We Forgive Our Debtors: Bankruptcy and Consumer Credit in America." Hide Caption 10 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren takes her seat to testify before the House Budget Committee in 2009. The United States was battling a recession at the time, and Warren had been appointed to a congressional oversight panel overseeing the $700 billion Troubled Assets Relief Program. Hide Caption 11 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner listen to President Barack Obama at the White House in September 2010. Obama was appointing Warren to be his assistant and special adviser to the Treasury Secretary in order to launch the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Warren had long called for a federal agency designed to protect consumers from fraudulent or misleading financial products. Hide Caption 12 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren and US Sen. Scott Brown, right, make fun of each other during an annual St. Patrick's Day breakfast in Boston. Warren announced in 2011 that she would be challenging Brown for his Senate seat.. Hide Caption 13 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren speaks to constituents at a campaign event in Scituate, Massachusetts, in May 2012. Hide Caption 14 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren takes a morning walk with her dog Otis on the Harvard University Business School campus in May 2012. Hide Caption 15 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren stands with family members after giving a speech in Springfield, Massachusetts, in June 2012. Warren has several grandchildren. Hide Caption 16 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren President Barack Obama greets Warren at a fundraiser in Boston in June 2012. Hide Caption 17 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren speaks at the Democratic National Convention in September 2012. Hide Caption 18 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren greets supporters during a campaign event at Boston University. Hide Caption 19 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren takes the stage after defeating Brown for a Senate seat in November 2012. Hide Caption 20 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren listens during a hearing of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs in May 2013. Hide Caption 21 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren meets with Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland in April 2016. Hide Caption 22 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren campaigns with Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in June 2016. Hide Caption 23 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren, a member of the Senate Banking Committee, questions Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf in September 2016. Warren unleashed a verbal barrage at Stumpf, calling the embattled bank boss "gutless" and demanding he step down. Her diatribe was the most forceful condemnation yet of Wells Fargo, who fired more than 5,000 employees over the years for creating fake accounts without customer knowledge. The employees created the fraudulent accounts to meet bank quotas and were allegedly threatened with firing if they didn't comply. Hide Caption 24 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren In January 2017, Warren posted this photo of her and Obama together. Obama was leaving after two terms as President. Hide Caption 25 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren holds a transcript of her speech in the Senate Chamber after she was cut off during the debate over Attorney General-designate Jeff Sessions in February 2017. In an extremely rare rebuke, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell silenced Warren after he determined that she violated a Senate rule against impugning another senator. Warren was reading from a 1986 letter in which Coretta Scott King, the widow of Martin Luther King Jr., was critical of Sessions -- who at the time was a nominee to be a federal judge. Hide Caption 26 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren and other Democrats listen as President Donald Trump speaks to a joint session of Congress in February 2017. Hide Caption 27 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren US Sen. Bob Corker talks with Warren during a Senate committee hearing in June 2017. Hide Caption 28 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren attends a confirmation hearing for Jerome Powell, who was nominated to be chairman of the Federal Reserve, in November 2017. It was a day after President Donald Trump referenced Warren as "Pocahontas" during an event honoring Navajo code talkers. Conservatives have long criticized Warren for claiming that she is part Native American, and the senator's heritage became an issue during her Senate campaigns. Trump seized on the attacks and has regularly mocked Warren by calling her "Pocahontas." In October 2018, Warren released results of a DNA test showing she has distant Native American ancestry. The DNA results claimed "strong evidence" of Native American ancestry "6-10 generations ago." But it only served to intensify the criticism given her distant ties. Hide Caption 29 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren runs down Boston's Clarendon Street waving to crowds during the annual Boston Pride Parade in June 2018. Hide Caption 30 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren and US Sen. Susan Collins ride the Senate subway in June 2018. Hide Caption 31 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren is seen in the sunglasses of Arian Rustemi during a rally in Boston in June 2018. Warren was calling for the swift reunification of children and parents who had been separated at the US-Mexico border. Hide Caption 32 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren helps Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams make calls to voters in October 2018. Hide Caption 33 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren A Warren figurine sits in the back pocket of Mary Jo Kane during a town-hall event in Boston in October 2018. Hide Caption 34 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren was re-elected in 2018. Here, she is joined by her husband, Bruce Mann, as Vice President Mike Pence re-enacts her swearing-in. Hide Caption 35 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren, her husband and dog Bailey attend an event in Manchester, New Hampshire, in January 2019. Warren had recently announced that she was forming an exploratory committee for the 2020 presidential race. Hide Caption 36 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren speaks in Columbia, South Carolina, in January 2019. Hide Caption 37 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren looks down at the crowd in Lawrence, Massachusetts, before formally announcing her presidential bid in February 2019. Hide Caption 38 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren answers questions at a town-hall event in Jackson, Mississippi, in March 2019. Hide Caption 39 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren makes a pinky promise with 8-year-old Sydney Hansen during a campaign stop in Peterborough, New Hampshire, in July 2019. Hide Caption 40 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren US Sen. Bernie Sanders grabs Warren's hand during the CNN Democratic debates in July 2019. Sanders and Warren, two of the most progressive candidates in the field, were targeted early in their debate by their more moderate counterparts. Hide Caption 41 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren speaks at her Super Tuesday rally in Detroit in March 2020. Hide Caption 42 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren acknowledges supporters as she arrives to speak to the media outside her home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in March 2020. She had just dropped out of the presidential race. Hide Caption 43 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren appears on "Saturday Night Live" with actress Kate McKinnon, playing Warren, in March 2020. "I wanted to put on my favorite outfit to thank you for all you've done in your lifetime," McKinnon said. "I'm not dead," Warren responded. "I'm just in the Senate." The two then said the show's famous catchphrase, "Live ... from New York! It's Saturday night!" Hide Caption 44 of 45 Photos: Former presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren Warren asks questions during a Senate committee hearing in June 2020. She was appearing via video conference because of the coronavirus pandemic. Hide Caption 45 of 45

Despite the criticism, Warren has shown no sign of backing off her core message or the plans that, so many months ago, gave her campaign its initial lift. Recent polling has underscored the broad popularity of the wealth tax she would use to fund her education platform.

"If there are people running for president who think it's more important to protect the two cents of the millionaires and billionaires, I'm ready to have that fight," Warren said after an event Saturday night in Chicago, passing up the chance -- as she would again in Iowa the next day -- to fire back directly at Buttigieg.

Instead, Warren appears to be banking on what many seasoned operatives view as her top-notch ground game in Iowa to deliver for her when the time comes. In a recent interview with former Obama campaign manager David Plouffe on his "Campaign HQ" podcast , Beto O'Rourke's former campaign manager Jen O'Malley Dillon, also an Obama campaign vet, testified to its strength.

"I have been really impressed by the organization that Elizabeth Warren has built on the ground," O'Malley Dillon said. "Her team (in Iowa) is very strong. They're just doing the work every day, and I think that that's just been apparent from the start."

That analysis was echoed by another former campaign hand in Iowa, who told CNN said that, while it was clear that Buttigieg is now doing well in the state after a stretch of favorable media coverage, Warren remains in a strong position.

"Obviously with any campaign you want to be riding high the entire time but caucusgoers are notoriously fickle, they want to be courted," the strategist, who asked to speak on the condition of anonymity because they are in contact with some 2020 campaigns, said. "I think whether someone has a good couple of months in the national press is going to resonate here and we're seeing that with Buttigieg."

"If I were on (the Warren campaign)," the strategist added, "I'd be comfortable in the position they're in," the operative said. "They've developed a very solid operation here."