music, therapy, and me

Does anyone else remember the television show, Changing Places ? It was on HGTV for a time in the 2000s (I think - it might have been at another time, but I am too lazy to switch to a new tab and find out). I used to love watching that show. Friends would work with interior designers to refresh a portion of each others' houses - all in secrecy and with interesting results. I was always opinionated about what they were doing in the spaces, so I enjoyed watching. I am not changing places right now. I have left one part-time job, so I have a bit of extra time that I have not had since 1998. For some reason, though, I keep thinking about this show. (I might be getting sick - constant rumination on very narrow, very specific topics is one of my body's ways of showing me that germs are taking over my life.) I keep thinking about how you expect something to turn out but that things often go out of your realm of imagination when you bring in other people into the equation. My life is n...

Yesterday, I left a job that I have had for 26 years. I left it because it was a toxic work environment where I was used and assigned all sorts of things that I was not interested in. I did not get a pay increase for eight years. They decided to accept my resignation rather than give me the $157 annual increase that I asked for. So, I am no longer working at the church where I have been since 1998. There is a strange type of grief that happens when you leave a job that is similar to losing a person from your life but not exactly the same. I am crying about not being wanted by this community anymore, but I am also so happy about being out of the toxicity that surrounded my job. I spent most of the last year resenting a role imposed upon me that changed every week, often 4 minutes before the start of one of my roles without notice. I was also not given an evaluation, pay increase, or direction for eight years. I asked for a change in my responsibilities to make them more appropriate for ...

Here it is, Tuesday again, and I am avoiding the thought of having to go to work - not because I am not looking forward to working, but because I just don't want to leave my bed. Bed is comfortable, but money is essential, so I will get going. I did not sleep much overnight, waking at 1:30 and not getting back to sleep, so I am just plain old tired, but that's not the topic of this morning's post. Today is Tuesday, so it is time to talk about being thrifty! Speaking of thrift, let's talk thrift stores! My sister and my mother are champion thrifters! (Spell-check doesn't like that word, but I do, so we are going to keep it!) They have a series of thrift stores that they frequent several times per month where they keep an eye out for things for my sister's classroom, for my mother's various collections, for gifts for others, and for my music therapy practice.  Now, I am nowhere near their level of thriftiness, but I am starting to try it out. Things to look fo...

I am currently in the middle of an AMTA self-assessment. Have you heard about this? This document was published in 2008 by the Professional Advocacy Committee at the time. It is supposed to be a way to evaluate ourselves based on the AMTA Standards of Clinical Practice, and I have some problems with it. As I read through this document, I am interested by the dichotomy between what AMTA folx think is the view of the "perfect music therapist" and the realities of my job assignment. Using this assessment, I am not acting as a music therapist because my job requirements do not match what AMTA thinks I should be doing in my job. This is a common situation that I find between the AMTA ideal of a music therapist and the reality of being a music therapist in the world of health care, education, and wherever! Now, should I be striving for the ideal? Somewhat, I guess, but I am in a place where many of the things on this assessment are not decided by me - they are decided by people who...

I wrote an opening song this week and turned it into a therapeutic music experience. I also spent some time just singing things and trying to stretch my vocal cords a bit after being an alto all summer rather than singing in my soprano range. As I was singing and composing and writing up procedures, I was thinking about this post series and how it has changed how I think about songwriting. Songwriting is something that I enjoy, but I didn't always want to do this part of our job. I don't think that many other music therapists want to do it either, at least based on the number of times I read requests for songs to be given and shared. AS I became a bit more confident in my skills, I found songwriting to be a great way to engage my clients in therapy. We compose songs together - I used to do this regularly with my clients, but I have stopped recently - perhaps I should start that up again... I find that there are many things that I enjoy doing as a composer. I am a great composer...

Here it is, already Saturday, and I haven't written a post since Monday morning. That is a bit because of my week, and a bit because I just like sleeping so much more these days than writing. I'm sorry about that because I do enjoy writing, but there are times when it is more than I can do to get up and sit at the computer. Today, though, I have more time ahead of me, so I got my opportunity to recline and relax before having to get going. I am blogging this morning in the midst of crying and body malfunctions and mystery bruises that arrive overnight. I've heard it from many people - getting old is NO JOKE! I think most of my current resistance to actually getting up is that I HAVE to get up. It is much easier for me to get going when I feel like getting going and not on a schedule that is not my own to control. Oh well. I will have a bit more control once I retire from this full-time existence. How many days?? *Just kidding - I have a monthly countdown going in my work pl...

I am happy to announce that I have published the next chapter of my Music Therapy Internship Handbook in my TPT store. If you are new here, I would like you to know that I am writing a general music therapy internship handbook - one chapter at a time. This chapter, Settling Into the Role of Music Therapy Intern , joins the three other chapters which cover finding an internship, preparing for the first day, and the first day of the music therapy internship experience. All of those chapters can be found in my TPT store . I am enjoying this experience. I have always been more fascinated with how we do the process of music therapy than any other part of our jobs. The internship seems to be a mystery to music therapy students - it was when I started looking for my internship, and it still seems to be difficult to find information. Eventually, I would love for music therapy students to use this handbook when they start looking for their internships.  I am trying to cover some of the minu...

I recently saw a request for s specific type of song for a specific goal, and I did not respond to the request because my response would have been rather snarky. I wonder why people do not make up their own songs in these types of situations. I really do. Why do you need to ask for songs when you could write your own? Were these music therapists not taught to write music as students? Are they laboring under some imposter syndrome symptoms that tell them that they cannot write their own songs? Is it easier to ask for others to give them something than it is to spend some time making their own thing? After I abstained from responding in a vein similar to the paragraph above, I started wondering if I just do this because I haven't always had the ability to ask others for their work.  Gather 'round, children, as I tell you a tale from the 20th Century...   In the days afore email, social media, and home computers, we music therapists had to create our own songs, take them to confe...

It has been an interesting week. I have been back to work for one day, and things are looking up a bit. I was able to get the vacuuming done in my storage room. I took in my dolly and moved cabinets around to make the space a bit more conducive to my needs as a therapist and task box creator than as an intern office. If I get any more interns, then I will change things up again to accommodate those good humans, but for now, I am happy with the way it looks. The problem for today is that I have to do professional development but most of my paper stuff and visuals are in my main music therapy room rather than my storage area. They have to get back to the storage area by the end of today. I have to sort through, place in appropriate places, inventory the stuff, and then put it away - all while watching various videos about the usual stuff that we go through at the start of every year. I wish they would change the videos from year to year, but they do not. All of this to say that I want to...

It is time. Today is the first day of the 2024-2025 regular school year. Now, it is not the first day of my contract year - that happened in July, but it is the first day of the school year as far as my school district office is concerned. Actually, it's not even that - the rest of the district doesn't come back until Monday, but for some reason, we start earlier than everyone else. Sigh. At least I get paid for these extra days. Today is a work day where I will have an entire day to organize my storage room. I am ready to make that space a bit more useful for me as therapist rather than as an office space for interns. Since I do not have any interns scheduled at the moment, I can use the space the way I need it rather than how I want it prepared for interns. If I get interns again, I can always adapt the space to make it work for them. If not, then it works for me. I would like to remove everything from the room and then give it a good cleaning. That reminds me to put the doll...

Welcome back to the Thrifty Therapist series here at music, therapy, and me. Let's talk about sound makers and finding ways to make them for our clients to use during music therapy sessions - sound makers that do not cost much to make, use, or replace when needed! As a beginning music therapist, way back in the very late 1900's (yep, I am THAT old), I had no money. I mean, I was living with my parents, paying them for groceries, and barely making my car payment with my $6.50 an hour job. I was a recreation therapist at a residential treatment facility, and I had nothing. I think I had a guitar and that was about it, but I still needed to find ways to make music with my clients. As a result of little to no money and very few resources, I had to get creative. Fortunately, I have a mother who taught us to get creative and to look in all sorts of ways to do what we need and want to do. So, finding ways to make music with my clients was something that I took as a challenge more than...

It is the Monday before I head back to my school-based therapy job, and I am not ready to give up the life of a lady of leisure... at all! It is pretty silly to want more time off, but that's the way it is right now. Since it is Monday, it is time to write a bit about being an internship supervisor. Now, I haven't had an intern since January, and it appears that I will not have an intern in the near future. That is fine with me because I am enjoying the process of doing therapy rather than teaching someone else how to do therapy, but I also miss being a supervisor a bit. To fill the time and to accomplish something that I have dreamed about for a long time, I am writing a general internship handbook. The first three chapters are published through my TPT store . To access them, you have to sign up for TPT (formally Teachers Pay Teachers), but it is free, and you can access so many free resources that it is more than worth it (in my opinion). Anyway, if you are or know any music ...

Let's do some songwriting today. It has been some time since I have written on this topic, but it is time to get going again because I am getting ready to move back into my school contract and my regular work routine. That starts with writing about composing on Sundays. Here we go! I haven't been doing much formal composition lately but I have been improvising during sessions. My favorite way to improvise is to start a familiar chord progression and then sing what I see happening in the session. I have several familiar chord progressions that I use often - I, vi, IV, V7; I, V7; IV; 12-bar blues. These progressions are my foundation for my improvisations. Once I start with the chord progression, there are no further rules to follow. The lyrics, melodies, and every other element are allowed to go where they want to go. These songs are ones that are destined to be in the moment and not captured for further use. My brain just doesn't work to remember those elements once the ses...

I am doing something that I rarely do during my breaks from my job as a school-based music therapist - I am leaving my house for a craft class! I signed up for this craft class back in June for a July class, but the instructor broke her elbow and had to reschedule. This is the day, so I am looking forward to going to make something new with people (hopefully, more than just me there!) who share some of my interests in paper and making books. I know the business owner makes the types of books that I like to make, but who knows if there will be others?? I certainly hope so. I have two and a half hours before the class starts, and my time anxiety is already starting. I will go get gas for the car, breakfast for me, and then sit in the parking lot until the store actually opens. I will bring a small bag of my personal favorite crafting items, and I will bring some money for shopping as well! The last time I tried something like this, I ended up being the only person who showed up for the c...

I have tried to write the past two days - I really have, but things have not worked out the way I thought it would happen. I just found myself becoming bored with what I was writing about. No reason to continue when that happens, so I just stopped. I have six days (including today) before I head back to my hot music therapy clinic to start the 2024-2025 school year. I have a doctor's appointment and a crafting class in those six days (I am trying to remember that I have that crafting class on Saturday - I've prepaid, so I don't want to miss it!). Other than finishing up six of the seven books that I borrowed from the library, I have little to nothing else to do until work starts back up. Yesterday, I finished laminating most of the materials that I made recently. The file folders are not laminated because I accidentally bought the wrong type of laminating film and it is not working well with the laminators that I have here at home. I will figure out how to make it work once...