music, therapy, and me

I am struggling right now to make sense out of our world. There are things that are happening that are traumatic. There are things that are wrong. There are things that will ruin us as a whole that are happening because of a very small number of people who presume that we share their ideas. I have a father and several family members who think that the things happening now are the greatest things ever. The rest of us don't talk about these things.

I have been on a news hiatus since the last Presidential election. I find myself either yelling and getting furious at what I hear or I cry about it. There is very little in between, and I just cannot go through that process every day. So, I avoid listening to the news. Right now, though, there is no ignoring what is happening to families in our nation.

I work with children who have been separated from their original families and often from many other family units as well. Sometimes those separations have been warranted - the family was una…

This morning, as I was wondering what to write about, I stumbled upon an NPR article entitled, "'Cutting edge' program for children with autism and ADHD rests on razor-thin evidence." Oh boy. Talk about a headline to suck me into reading the full article!! Talk about autism and programming? I'm there!

I read through the entire article. It concerns a franchise treatment program that purports to "cure" ADHD and autism. The franchise program is called Brain Balance. There is a franchise that is close to the movie theater near my parents' home - I noticed it last December when we went to see The Last Jedi, and the claims made on the windows (the only thing that was available to see) were astonishing! Curing autism? Hmm.

Just so you know, I personally don't think that autism is something that needs to be cured. I think that persons with autism deserve to be celebrated the way that they are, but the world isn't ready to shift for them yet.

So, the ar…

Usually, Tuesdays are my easiest post days. I simply pull out something from my TME file and copy it into the post and, voila! I am finished. During summer, however, I am all off my regular schedule due to changes in my work schedules and the abundance of sunshine and all the darn pollen out there, so I get a bit discombobulated when it comes to having my plans finished up.

I think I may take a bit of a TME Tuesday hiatus this summer - I will try to focus on things like writing TMEs or coming up with ideas - or, I may just do TMEs, who knows, but since it has been a bit of a surprise to me that Tuesday comes around every week, it seems for the best.

Of course, that means generating material for these "not necessarily TME Tuesdays." This may be more difficult than I originally thought.

So, since I've made this decision this morning, I guess I'll go with it.

Today's topic? Hmmm.


I firmly believe that every music therapist who works with clients should have a bag of tric…

If you've been reading this blog lately, you know that I have recently taken up another task - one that I love - the role of Internship Director. My intern is starting her third week with us this week, and nothing has gone like I planned. Now, from the get-go, let me tell you that none of this has anything to do with the intern. She's been doing exactly what she's been told and seems to be taking things in stride.

Nope. Everything that is going on is on my end. Would you like the rundown?


I was fortunate to get her into the three day behavior management training during her first week. I perused the calendar very carefully and sent her to the place indicated on the training calendar. They had moved the training to a completely different location. The training calendar did not have the correct times listed on it for the training that she was supposed to have. We ended up working several hours extra because the trainers said, and I quote, "Well, we don't really follow …

I often wonder, during my reading about things trauma related, what happens when trauma is denied - when people do not remember trauma or like to pretend that it never happened.

A bit of antecedent information. I have a family member who has never had a stable home life. His mother and father were together when he was born, lived together until he was 3, and then split up. They were never married, so he did not go through the "trauma of divorce," but the only thing that was different was the legal aspect of that type of separation - everything else was the same. Neither of his parents is very stable. His father has continuing health issues, a new family (which is breaking up), and he has recently moved away from this family member - to the other side of the world, to be near the little son who is also living on the other side of the world. The family member is staying with his mother who bounces from relationship to relationship, often having more than one at a time. She has …

It is Friday again. The wind is blowing from the east (it seems). It is getting really hot out here - one thermometer said 95 degrees Fahrenheit and the other one on my way home said 102 degrees. My allergies are horrible as things are blooming, growing, flourishing, and blowing around. I am on every single medication that I take, and my nose is STILL running, I am hoarse, and I cannot take a full breath without coughing, sneezing, or THE MOST FUN OF ALL doing both at the same time.

Today is a day off from work. That's a good thing. I am sitting here, in pajamas, getting ready for a day of nothing. It is also payday, so I will pay my bills, but that's all I have to do. I can sleep all day, if I want to. I want to do a paint pouring project (my first ever) today, so that's something that I will try as I am in between naps.

On one of my social media posts, I saw a job post for a part-time music therapist at the facility where I did my music therapy internship. I interviewed fo…