Time to Write Things Down - A Luxury

www.musictherapyworks.com
I have arrived at the time of every intern's existence where I am not needed as much. I am currently spending lots of time in my office where I can see and be seen but where I am obviously "working" while my senior intern runs her therapy sessions. I am there for oversight due to regulations about volunteer interns and staff supervision, but I am essentially bowing out of the therapeutic relationship and moving more into the role of observer. As a result of this shift in responsibility, I am finding myself sitting and watching the same things happening with different groups of people, and I tend to get sleepy during all the observation time.

So, I am manufacturing things to do to keep myself engaged and attending to what I need to attend to during these observation sessions.

Yesterday, I sat through a drum set TME and a rhythm game TME and wrote up a new TME for my files. I've been making some file folder activities to put into my theme boxes. I'll be trying to print a music-themed lapbook set to assemble some new visuals (printing failed yesterday for some reason) - in an effort to make something come out of this time.

Honestly, I feel a bit guilty just sitting and watching. Now, I know that this is an essential part of every intern's existence and success, but I don't do well with just watching clients engage in music therapy. I got into this profession because I love making music with clients and working with clients towards their desired outcomes - I did NOT get into this profession to only watch others do this job. I know this about myself, and this is one of the reasons that I do not accept interns for simultaneous internships, but I stagger their start dates so I can always have a bit of therapy going on in my life. I am already dreading the days when both of my current interns are doing their sessions without me being a fixture in the group. It will happen, I know, and then the senior intern will graduate, and I will get to be the therapist for her groups again - before the new intern starts to take over. It just never seems to end.

I had the staggering realization that I've been an internship director for 20 years now. Some of my former interns have been music therapists for 20 years! That just amazes me. I have not had interns continuously throughout that 20 years, but I have had 23 interns graduate from my program, and there are 2 here currently. I think I met #26, and #27 is out there just waiting to arrive. I'm getting application requests from students from university programs that have NEVER applied before, and people seem very interested in my client population - that is GREAT! I will have to take a break from being internship director to be simply therapist at some point, but I'm not really feeling too disconnected from this profession that I love at the moment. Talk to me a bit in three months, and we'll see if that has changed. 

Right now, though, I am taking time to write things down. Comments, observations, and tips for my interns - TME ideas - new songs - plans for myself and for organizing the music therapy room. I am refining my work bullet journal process, and I am going to try reading the latest edition of the Journal of Music Therapy which arrived on Monday. I still need to be able to listen and respond to situations in the music therapy room as they arise, but I also need to be stepping away from clients as my interns build their own therapeutic relationships with students. I always have some heart wrenches when clients identify with interns more or differently than they relate to me, but that's part of being an internship director as well.

I am going to find something to do when I get to my office. I'll do the notes from the groups that I co-led with my junior intern (she doesn't have to document until she is doing full groups), I'll rearrange things in my office, and I'll putter a bit, trying to find something to do during the times that I am sitting in the semi-darkness at my desk. I'll take the time to write things down on paper. Something that I always want to do, but can never justify the time to do, but now... I have plenty of time.

Happy Wednesday.

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