Parents, Professionals, and Diagnoses

My last article was a little reflection on my own daughter and music, my gifts, and “my wish.” In my conversations in recent weeks with parents of clients, I wanted to write a little on professional dealings with parents. Last week, you got a glimpse of one of the “twinkles in my eye.” In conversations… Read more »

“My Wish”

My sincere apologies to all my faithful subscribers, until recently, I have put out a newsletter weekly. I  have acquired some new work and have two children graduating this year, which has required my presence at many different functions. In light of that fact, I thought I would give you a glimpse of how music… Read more »

Avoidance vs. Seeing it Through

When a child, or for that matter, an adult, devises an unhealthy or negative behavior and utilizes it to get what they think they want or gain control, what do we do? What happens afterward? What is the end result? First we have to know what it is that the child really wants. If we… Read more »

Opening Up Lines of Communication: Relate Instead of Correct

Often those on the autism spectrum present behaviors which may seem odd, antisocial, or nonsensical to us. In order to help these individuals, the well-meaning urge for many to correct these behaviors comes to the forefront. Today I would like to delve slightly deeper into why correcting these behaviors instead of accepting and relating to… Read more »

Asking Why And Honoring All That One Can Give

I have written many articles on subjects such as developing children’s strengths  https://backmountainmusictherapy.com/2013/03/the-amazing-power-of-building-on-a-childs-strength/  , achieving regulation,   https://backmountainmusictherapy.com/2012/11/part-4-achieving-self-regulation/ ,  significance in an individual’s development    https://backmountainmusictherapy.com/2012/04/recognizing-development-and-its-significance-in-each-individual/ , and sensory integration  https://backmountainmusictherapy.com/2011/11/sensory-integration-meeting-the-need/   .  On a day-to-day basis in my professional work, I have frequently been complimented on the degree of patience others have noticed.  Most times, I truly have… Read more »

The Amazing Power of Building on a Child’s Strength

As I reflected on my busy and varied week, working with kids of all ages, I stopped to think what theme pervaded my week. The children displayed many strengths, but often, as adults, we don’t look beyond the tip of the iceberg, and just see them disguised as weaknesses. Why do we do that? I… Read more »

Rhythm as a Healing Element

Last week I talked about rhythm – the most basic element of music – and how we are born to live rhythmically. We are born with a basic beat, a heartbeat, and live our lives at regular intervals, minute to minute, hour by hour, day and night, month to month, year to year. Rhythm sets… Read more »

Rhythm: The Element of Movement

After taking a coarse from Christine Stevens entitled “Music Medicine”, one of the concepts brought up in her coarse specifically, I had begun to look at , ignited reflection on the work I do, the concept of rhythm. Rhythm- the measurement of pulse, a regular scheduled timing of continuous sound and silence, movement and rest…. Read more »