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About a year ago, my 87 year old father was in rehabilitation, recovering from another bout of pneumonia. He was starting to experience physical decline, no longer able to use his walker and reliant on a wheelchair.
My father, who was always the sharpest tool in the shed, was also starting to face cognitive decline.
I was wheeling him around the rehabilitation corridors, making the attempt to get him up and about when the Peter, Paul and Mary song, “If I Had A Hammer” played over the speaker in the hallways. Always our favorite song, I began to sing and my dad, who also had hearing issues, sang along with me.
“Dad, you sound so good,” I raved, but I shouldn’t have been surprised. He sang in church choir his entire life and had a beautiful tenor voice.
We sang another song and that’s when it happened. My dad, who had started to fade, was back. As if coming out of a haze, he was fully engaged, sharp and memories returned.
It didn’t last long. He took a nap and when he woke up, the dreaded fog was back.
I noticed a piano covered up with a blanket, hiding away in the corner of the cafeteria. I asked for permission to use the piano between meal times.
Once a day, I wheeled my father in and I’d play his favorite songs. We’d sing as dozens of wheelchairs filed in. They thought I was a part of the staff. We’d sing for a while and each time, my father was back, if only for a while.
Is there science behind music as therapy?
Science is finally catching up with what musicians have known since the dawn of time: singing heals and is beneficial for our emotional, physical and cognitive well being.
Music Therapy is a relatively new science at just 50 years old. The science behind the benefits of singing is staggering:
- Magnesium is released when we breathe deeply.
- Singing releases serotonin and dopamine, those feel good chemicals necessary for balancing moods.
- Endorphins are released when we sing that diminish pain, triggering an almost analgesic feeling in the body.
- Cortisol is lowered.
- Singing increases prolactin production, which helps to regulate the immune system.
- Singers have more circuit connections between the right and left brain than non-singers.
This is just the tip of the iceberg.
When dementia and Alzheimer’s patients are encouraged to sing along to songs from their youth, they respond in promising and surprising ways.
There is the story of Henry. In a now-famous YouTube video, Henry, an elderly man with dementia, is transformed by the power of music. Initially slumped in a chair and unable to recognize his own daughter, Henry seems to be miraculously brought out of his haze by a few minutes of music from his youth. He gushes about his favorite jazz singer, sings a few verses in a rich baritone and waxes poetic about how music makes him feel. After listening to music, he can communicate; just like my father.
Teepa Snow, an internationally recognized occupational therapist who founded Positive Approach to Care, recommends two music interactions per day for optimum brain memory health.
What are other mental exercises to use with music?
The senior services industry demographic is in a time of change. What was once populated with the World War Two generation, we now find Baby Boomers moving in, who expect more from every stage of life. They also have the means to facilitate this and want to make the attempt to turn back the clock on aging.
The main goal is to battle the war against physical and cognitive decline.
“Move for Minds,” founded by Maria Shriver whose father died of Alzheimer’s disease, says that dementia and memory decline affects 5.8 million Americans, but there’s more hope than ever.
“Move for Minds” offers several tips to maintain brain health:
- Be aerobic: exercise, specifically dance aerobic is the most impactful way to protect your brain and stave off aging and memory decline. Exercise builds up the hippocampus which is critical for long term memory and is also where the plaque and tangles of Alzheimer’s begins.
- Work on balancing your body with practices like tai chi and yoga.
- Add music to your life.
- Meditate: meditation, the Benjamin Button of disciplines, literally causes your brain to age backwards.
A good example of the benefits of meditation is Steve Jobs, a daily practitioner of Transcendental Meditation. When Steve died at age 56, his brain was a young 27 due to his daily meditation habit.
Studies conducted at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital show that meditation for 30 minutes each day for eight weeks increases focus, self confidence, regulates emotion to learn, memory, perspective empathy, compassion and lessens stress.
Some forward thinking Independent and Assisted Living facilities are taking advantage of these new findings and incorporating music therapy into their programs. It’s paying off, as studies find that seniors who sing on a daily basis suffer less depression, have fewer doctor visits, need less medication and have increased activity.
“Rhythm Fitness Therapy,” a functional therapeutic class, combines music, singing, rhythm fitness with dance cardio along with yoga, stretching and meditation/mindfulness. It’s a seamless class, incorporating everything required for optimum brain and body health. It’s like getting five classes in one and gives the biggest bang for the buck.
We have just scratched the surface in discovering what Music Therapy can do for the mind. And even if all we achieve are a few more lucid moments with our aging loved ones, that is enough. Who wouldn’t move heaven and earth to have just one more moment with the ones we love?
