How Music Helps You Heal

Welcome to Natural Nutmeg’s Second Annual Healthy Aging Guide!

Aging is not the end of the world and actually comes with benefits. The sad part is too many people wait until they are told they have a limited amount of time left to live before they really start living.

Our hope is this Healthy Aging Guide will be an amazing resource for readers 50+ who truly want to redefine what it means to age, as well as a resource for how to help elderly parents.

The following section contains Connecticut’s vetted resources of practitioners and businesses that provide services to people 50+ and their caregivers. Our mission is always to help people navigate these important choices so they can age gracefully and positively, which is now more important than ever.

How Music Helps You Heal

By Neil Anand, Owner, ComForCare Home Care

Music is primal to life and expressed by each of us every day, whether through dancing to a favorite tune, keeping rhythm with a pencil, or remembering a special time when hearing a forgotten melody. It is central to our lives and is embedded in our culture, defining how we acknowledge milestones, rites of passage, and celebrations, as well as providing comfort, transformation, and inspiration. Music links us to our world and provides a pathway back to our past. A number of research studies have looked at the therapeutic use of music as an important adjunct to medical treatment and have found that music: • Promotes trust and safety • Promotes healing • Alleviates pain • Helps manage stress and anxiety • Helps with neurological impairments • Promotes socialization • Helps us communicate

Regarding music and dementia, according to the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America, music has power—especially for individuals with Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias. And it can spark compelling outcomes even in the very late stages of the disease. When used appropriately, music can shift mood, manage stress-induced agitation, stimulate positive interactions, facilitate cognitive function, and coordinate motor movements. This happens because rhythmic and other wellrehearsed responses require little to no cognitive or mental processing. They are influenced by the motor center of the brain that responds directly to auditory rhythmic cues. A person’s ability to engage in music, particularly rhythm playing and singing, remains intact late into the disease process because, again, these activities do not mandate cognitive functioning for success.

Other resources: • Tune in at 1 pm every weekday for live music (hits from the 30s to 60s) on our Facebook page, www.facebook.com/comforcarefairfield. • Access Joyful Memories playlists on SoundCloud (search for Steve Toll Joyful Memories), https://soundcloud. com/steve-toll-183664833/sets/ inspirational-songs.

• If you are a rehabilitation center, assisted living facility, adult day center, or senior center, contact the ComForCare office at 203.612.8966 to request a FREE live music program that your residents can enjoy. Portions of this article were originally featured on blog.comforcare.com. The views expressed in this post are the author’s own.

To learn more about home care, visit ComForCare.com/FairfieldCT or call 203.612.8966 for a no-obligation consultation. ComForCare Home Care is a premier provider of in-home care, helping older adults live independently in their own homes and continue to do all the things they love. The home care company is committed to helping people live their best life possible and offers special programs for people with Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia. ComForCare Home Care, serving Fairfield and New Haven Counties. 1700 Post Road, Suite E5, Fairfield, CT 06824. ComForCare.com/FairfieldCT; fairfieldct@comforcare.com. See ad on page 32.