music, therapy, and me

Today is the last day of my workweek. Around work, some of us affectionately call this day "Thursday-Friday" because that encapsulates the feeling of what this day means to us all. I am more than ready for this. It has been a week of insomnia, red eyes, unpredictable students, and rising heat and humidity. Let's finish this week in a strong manner and then just go! "That client" spent three minutes in music therapy before escalating into a screaming tantrum that lasted the entire session. I was singing "that client's" verse of the opening song - which "that client" volunteered for, and I guess "that client" was upset that I dared to sing to them.  My other groups went well, I guess. No one else was incensed by my singing, so I guess that was a good thing. I have finished sixteen groups and have only five to go today. The last group includes another "that client," so it may be a rough afternoon. At my school job, studen...

I have a suspicion that tomorrow will be our first snow day of the season, and I have an intern who needs to finish up hours before graduating on Wednesday. I do not want to extend the internship again, so I am planning on being present during our snow day, even if I have to spend the night in my office rather than driving home. I am currently sitting here, waiting to take my shower and head out because I do not want to get to work too early, especially since I am planning on staying there for the entire night. Right now, there is only one school district in the area we serve that has closed - on one website - all of the others are not registering any closings that affect my clients. I get an incentive to show up on inclement weather days - an additional day off to use when I need it. I will add this upcoming snow day to my sick time so I can have some more of that time. My intern is expected to graduate on Wednesday. We need 26 more hours to reach the 1020 hours needed by AMTA and my ...

It is the dawn of day three of the regular school year, and I just plain old don't want to go today.  This is not uncommon for me around this time of year. I am feeling pretty arthritic and tired and crabby, so I just don't want to leave my bed and go anywhere. I know that I need a paycheck, so I go anyway. Once I'm at work, I am completely happy to be there, but it is the process of getting there that I do not like. It was hard to get upright this morning. It doesn't help that today is a Wednesday. We have six groups today. I am tired just thinking about it. Once September starts, Wednesdays are my choir rehearsal nights, so the day is full from dawn to past dusk. So, I usually feel this way on Wednesdays. The rest of this week will be really easy. We see three groups on Thursdays and two groups on Fridays. I am filling the gaps in our Thursday schedule by adding in push-in groups for some of our classrooms and scheduling some individual sessions. My Fridays are being ...

It is Synthesis Sunday, and I am getting myself ready to start music therapy sessions with my clients again. I spent most of the summer not doing much with clients due to two interns who were covering my caseload. Intern #33 graduated, so I get a bit of time as therapist until intern #35 takes over. Intern #34 is still doing the rest of the groups but will graduate in October, so I will get those clients back at that point. I am looking forward to having a chance to be therapist for a bit. I will be leading one group tomorrow afternoon. It is a group of tweens and teenagers that usually have significant issues with peer relationships, so I think we may focus a bit on social emotional learning in these next several weeks. We will do some teamwork, some social songs, and some emotional awareness TMEs. We are going to start with "I'm Not the Only Person In This Room." Since we are going back into a five day school week, my schedule is changing back to spreading out our class...

Today is the day that I start back to work after a rough, emotional, and challenging Winter Break. My father is in hospice care and had a lucid day yesterday. The day before he was hallucinating that he was the President of the United States and was pretty demanding of how such a personage should be treated. My heart doesn't ache so much about the departure of my Bella-cat, but I still think that I see her walking down the hallway every once in a while. It always ends up being one of my strands of hair getting into my peripheral vision, but I still look for her. Several of my friends have wanted me to go get another kitty, but I am not ready yet. Anyway, back to thinking about work. Today and tomorrow are supposed to be "work days" implying that we will have some uninterrupted time in our classrooms to organize and clean things up. As far as I know, we will have all of our students back in sessions starting on Wednesday. There will be another schedule change because one o...

I am going into work on a regular Friday!! I am going to work a regular Friday!! Today is a regular Friday! Why all this enthusiasm for going to work?? Why am I emphasizing a regular Friday? Well, readers, for the past two weeks, our Fridays have been inclement weather days which means that I have had to do extra music therapy groups for our residents. They still have to come to school on snow days because we only have the school staff available to coordinate their care on those days. So, I trudge through the ice and snow (when I can) to go down and do music therapy on those days - sessions that are completely different from our regular therapy - these sessions are more geared towards energy expression and fun than our usual sessions because, hello, SNOW DAY! Most of my students live at the facility full time. It is not something that they choose - they have to be there. Since they don't get much choice in whether they come to school when the rest of the world gets to stay ...

It's a strange paradox for me, but I find that shorter times off are more refreshing than longer times off. I usually get more of a sense of renewal and rest with my three day weekends during the summer than the nine days that I had at the beginning of the summer session. I'm not sure how that is, but it works for me, and makes me look forward to the summer session every single year. I usually work six days per week. On Sundays, I have a part-time job directing a choir and leading worship music, so it is not a day off. It is a day of work. The other five days per week are my regular work schedule days, so I tend to be busy lots of the time. During summer, my part-time job goes on hiatus because they don't want to have to pay me. I get my Sundays back during June, July, and most of August. I also have a four day work week because our residential program can function better with more consistent days in school than long breaks between sessions, so we get a longer amount of...

Today is a day off from work. During our Extended School Year, we have school from Monday through Thursday, and we have Fridays off. During the summer, I have the luxury of three day weekends - something I really enjoy. During the rest of the year, I have one day weekends, so three days is a mini-break every week. I love this schedule and would love to have it all the time (I've tried to figure it all out, and it doesn't work for our contracts...). Anyway, today is a day away from work, but it is not a day of rest. Today is the day that everything has to happen. I have a new washer and dryer set coming sometime between 8:30 and 10:30, the new cat sitter comes to check us out at 11:00, and I have lots of laundry to do (because of the need for the new washer and dryer) as well as about seventeen errands to do as well. Everything happens today. I've spent this past week getting back into the routine of working. I arrived early every day (not good for me or my morning rou...

It's another snow day shortened week at my home. I don't have to leave for work until two hours later than usual, and I get to leave work very early. I am enjoying this routine, and I am hoping I can do it again next spring semester. This is my compromise for having interns and lots of snow days. I take my least clinical day and shorten it to make up for all the extra snow day hours that I have worked this winter. I can't really take an entire week off in a row when I am supposed to be actively supervising music therapy intern volunteers, so I've arranged it so that I can take some time off every week. That means a bit more time at home on Friday mornings. I want to spend some time today getting back into a creation routine, so I am going to take some time to organize my crafting space and then make something. I also have my town's summer arts center class schedule. I think I may take a class this summer. I just have to settle for one and then pay the fee. So, w...

How many of you have never experienced the repetition and predictability of a record album with a scratch on it? Actually, don't tell me if you haven't had that particular experience. I think it would just make me feel old. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, back in the olden days, we had these things called "records." After use, they occasionally got scratched and if the scratch changed the grooves on the records, the needle that translated the grooves into sounds would skip grooves or return to one place on the record. If you didn't jog the needle out of the scratch into a complete groove, the same part of the music would repeat over and over again. February feels like a scratched record to me. It always has, ever since I moved to Kansas. I never really felt this way about February when I lived in California, but Kansas and February wear on me in a way that March and Kansas do not.  February is the month where we have the most inclement weather ...

We had a regular day yesterday. We did our regular schedule and saw the kids that we usually see on Tuesdays. It was a good day. Then I came home, had some dinner, went to sleep, got really bad acid reflux, and then had anxiety dreams all night. I awoke to find a rebuke for something that I was doing that was a careless mistake (my LEAST favorite mistakes) and that I had to fix. Fortunately, I only had to fix my mistake on 12 things (rather than the 95 that I will eventually complete), so that's somewhat positive. I just hate it when I make these types of mistakes - they stick in my brain (if I let them). The good thing is that I've fixed the mistake and will fix the template that I used that was also incorrect. So, my day is not really starting off as "regular," but I still have hope. Today looks like it will be a regular day. The high temperature is forecast to be 53 degrees Fahrenheit and there may be some sunshine involved as well. I should be seeing the stude...

I am really getting tired of not having my regular schedule happen. I have interns who are not getting to do their roles because of all of the interruptions. I have tons of documentation to do because I am seeing 64 students daily and have to keep up with notes (which reminds me, I have to do Friday's notes this morning - I'll have to leave extra early to get to work so I can get all the notes done and get ready for today's sessions as well). I haven't been able to do the consultations with my interns that we need to do because there aren't enough hours in the day. I am tired, I am cranky, and I am not at all happy that we have to do this yet again. To add to all of this, I now have to figure out when I can take off 72 hours in the next 4 months without depriving my junior intern of the supervision/consultation and need for oversight that she deserves. I won't get paid for those 72 hours, so I have to take them at some point. I already have plans for 32 hours,...

I am thankful that I was able to stay at home safe and sound yesterday for our fourth snow day. I am also going to go to work today during our fifth snow day because staying at home reminded me how much I do not like surprise days off without plans. I have no idea what I will be doing during the 30 minutes that I have scheduled for each class - I may just chuck it all in and open the store for that time - each class can come in and shop during their music therapy time. I may figure something else out, but I am going in! I have many co-workers who do not understand my preference for working on inclement weather days to staying at home. I'm not exactly sure myself why I would rather be doing things than getting under the covers and hibernating on bad weather days. I've never been off the inclement weather staff list. My biggest motivation is the promise of scheduled time off when I want it later on. Right now, though, I am starting to have some difficulty finding time to sche...

...but not really all that sorry since I am currently on vacation and am spending my time in my parents' guest room waiting for them to waken. I've been awake for about three hours now, and I have at least another 2 hours before anyone will start to stir. I've started, completed, and uploaded a new file to my Teachers Pay Teachers store , Music Notation Cards , and now I am sitting on the bed, surrounded by my computer, my bullet journal, my ideas book, and my tablet which is playing bullet journaling YouTube videos to keep me company. My songs are at my house, many hours away, so we will NOT be doing anything song-related this day. If that is why you are here, just go back to last week's post and know that I will be back into my regular routine next week. This week, however, I am still in vacation mode. I have today and tomorrow without travel plans and then I am traveling back to the full routine of work, being an internship director, seeing my cat, and doing the ...

This is going to sound strange, but today is a Wednesday-Tuesday-Thursday at my job. What does this mean? It means that it actually is a Wednesday, but it is the second day of the work week and is the second to last day of the work week. For my students, it is a Wednesday-Tuesday-Friday because they get a 4-day weekend. Teachers get a 3-day weekend, so we'll be student-less tomorrow and then will get Friday off. This is some sort of strange type thing that happens once per year at my facility - I'm not sure why. Anyway, this week is pretty much wasted time. As a solo therapist, it was not a week where I could address specific themes or topics because only half the school received therapy. So, I had to come up with non-themed sessions that addressed topics that were not as crucial to the entire program. Otherwise, I was playing catch-up with half of my groups. It was a challenge unless I viewed these as "bonus" sessions. As an internship director, that particular pre...

I admit it, I really don't like Monday holidays. I spent most of yesterday in a fog, trying to remember who I was supposed to see when, and I almost convinced myself that one group of students, sitting in front of me, was not the right group. I didn't say anything, however, because I figured that someone else would come in and correct the situation if I was right (I wasn't). I realized, during the ride home, that I completely forgot one of my pull-out sessions yesterday. Just completely blanked out on that one session. I did do the other seven sessions that I had planned for yesterday, but I feel bad about missing the one session. I much prefer Fridays off to Mondays off. When there are Monday holidays, I spend the rest of the week trying to catch up. With Friday holidays, I can do my regular routine without making changes to what I am doing and who I am seeing. I admit it (and it shouldn't be much of a surprise to folks who read this blog), I am creature of habit...

Today is the day we start our Extended School Year (ESY). We have four weeks of school before another week off and then three weeks to finish up the rest of ESY. It is also the day we start our new schedules including three new groups and new start/stop times. Of all the administrative tasks that music therapists face, I think that scheduling is one of the most difficult. I'm lucky. I only have to schedule for me. Some of my friends have to schedule many therapists. I think I would like to have that sort of challenge because scheduling is a puzzle for me. It is a very large logic puzzle, and I enjoy those types of challenges. Of course, I haven't had to coordinate the schedules of more than three therapists at once, so facing scheduling for many more therapists may not be as much fun, but I am thrilled by the idea of the challenge. Scheduling fulfills several of the things that I enjoy in life. I get to color-code things (so I can see different aspects easily). It is a puzz...

This has been a long week, full of differences and changes in schedules. We had an all-school event, Body Venture , on Tuesday. The event, an interactive, walk-through approximation of the body, required cancelling services, setting up the entire thing, and then tearing down the entire thing. It is always interesting to watch my clients interact and experience the event. There is just something a bit disconcerting about walking through the small intestine, isn't there? There's a video of this event at this link . The trouble with events like Body Venture has nothing to do with my clients. They seem to handle changes the way they always do - it's with me! If my schedule is changed, I seem to get a bit discombobulated - out of sync with my role in the world. I didn't get to see two entire classes of kids this week. I missed the time I usually get with those classes. In addition to Body Venture, we also had the annual holiday dinner. I usually don't go to those thi...

This is going to be a long week - it's a scheduled 44 hour week due to Back to School Night. Unfortunately, Back to School Night is scheduled for Wednesday (as are all of our 12 hour days this year), and I work on Wednesdays, so I will not be able to be there. As a result, I have to work my extra 4 hours at other times this week. Honestly, I would rather work 9 hours per day for four days than 12 hours on one day. The evening hours are mostly reserved for teachers to write IEP progress notes. I don't write progress notes, so I don't have the need for those extra hours at the end of the semester. I understand why the others do, but a "one-size-fits-all" calendar doesn't always fit us all. This year, though, the calendar was on my side. With all of the days scheduled on Wednesdays, I have an excuse for not participating. My Wednesday evening job is that of church choir director and worship leader, so I have to be there in order to earn my salary. If my Wedne...

I guess it's no secret that I enjoy a bit of organization, but that it is something that I struggle with in my own life. I understand the struggles of some of my clients and their need for structure and organization because I struggle in the same ways. I have some clients who want to know what is coming in the music therapy session. They seem unable to just go with improvisation. They have to know what to expect. When I'm working with a client that is schedule-dependent, I try to introduce the idea of flexibility, using this type of board. This is a simple visual aid that is primarily a music therapy tool. It doesn't do anything within a Therapeutic Music Experience (TME) but it does support the client within the session. I use this tool to assist the client in living within a schedule and still introducing the idea of flexibility. This visual aid has several features. First, there are TME and instrument choices on long paper strips. When the board is in use, those ...