The Power of Music  aka Chuck Berry Rocks

Johanna Skouras

Breast cancer. Staph infection. Blood clot. Macular degeneration and cataract. Progressive dementia. Silent stroke. Mind fading as contractures gradually turn my sister’s body to stone.

A lot for 82-year-old Arete, who’s resided in a nursing home for nearly a year. I visit four days a week, 35 miles roundtrip.

The facility and staff are nice. The food good, the building clean and warm. The TV room has plenty of windows and a functioning fireplace. A sunny dining area offers a nice view. I bring Arete favorite foods, and sunflower seeds to share with the sparrows around the patio. I struggle to talk with her and not at her.

Hostage to the wheelchair, I resist the painful truth of lost pleasures we long took for granted. She’ll never get back into my truck, even with a stool and a gentle assist. We won’t go to the beach to stroll in the sand, toes in the surf. No more trips to Moe’s to savor clam chowder and watch gulls and boats.

When staff advised me to “think hospice,” I thought, No. I won’t.

I began bringing Arete music I’d recorded years ago. Throughout my journeys around the world, my parents’ home was a makeshift storage bin whose lease had finally expired. I grew up with the Beatles, but Arete loved Rock ‘n Roll — especially Chuck Berry, the Big Bopper, and Jerry Lee Lewis.

These singers helped free us teens from parental values and beliefs lingering from the Cold War era.

Still, we knew enough to preserve the values of honesty, consideration and respect. We sought independence but weren’t exactly sure what that entailed. The music offered us wisdom, and maybe even a path toward liberation.

Arete’s right side is partially paralyzed, so I focus on what she can do. With many dementia patients, long-term memory holds. To strengthen her decision making, I ask her to choose Chuck Berry or Bill Haley and the Comets.

Listening to the latter, we chat about who she was in her twenties. Back when she interviewed celebrities and politicians during her stint as a radio reporter. We recalled her work as a newspaper copygirl during her summer away from studying journalism at university.

Arete easily remembered her red chiffon prom dress. The matching heels held the same magic as Dorothy’s shoes in The Wizard of Oz.

I was 14 when I gazed upon my sister that evening. Standing 5’7”, she exuded sensual confidence. I thought this must be what liberation was all about.

“Arete,” I said now, “You’re still the young woman in the red dress. She’s not gone, just resting.”

By this time Chuck Berry croons, “She’s got the grownup blues, tight dresses and lipstick. She’s sportin’ high-heeled shoes. . .” Arete’s left leg bounces with the rhythm, her left hand tapping along. Jerry Lee had found his way back into her heart.

Her glowing smile declares, “Hey, I’m alive!!”

We always ended visits with one of the bawdy boys: Chuck, Jerry, or even “Elvis the Pelvis.” The music pushed away her immediate fears, allowing her spirit to dance to happy memories.

Listening to music is different from working with a music therapist (who are highly educated, rigorously trained). Evidence shows that music therapy can lower blood pressure, reduce muscle tension and improve memory. Addressing a patient’s individual needs, a music therapist might encourage them to pick up a guitar and strum a familiar tune or help someone write a song from scribbled lyrics.

Music therapy is just one part of an overall treatment plan, and I know music can’t stop the assault on Arete’s body. But short-term joy has a miraculous power of its own, thanks to endorphins — the hormones released to ease pain and enhance pleasurable activities.

Arete’s favorite music awakens her sleeping hormones. If Chuck Berry and his cohorts can grant her precious interludes of relief, I’ll take it.

Johanna Skouras is a psychotherapist and author of the self-help book Standing Up for Yourself/The Art of Self-Assertion.