The Age Guide: Perspectives on the Aging Journey

Caregiving with Compassion: Harmonizing Together

• Age Guide • Season 2 • Episode 1

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On this  episode we interview John and Sandy Miller, Co-founders of the Sounds Good Choir to learn how this unique choir offers respite to caregivers of all ages while helping people with dementia and other disabilities connect to music and artistic expression. We’ll also introduce our new Caregiver Specialist, Caitlyn Tolentino to share other resources and supports for caregivers. And of course, you’ll get to hear clips from the Sounds Good Choir woven throughout the episode. We hope that this leaves you with a song in your heart and a better understanding of the difference caregiver and dementia support programs can make. 

https://soundsgoodchoir.org/

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SPEAKER_01:

Hello and welcome to The Age Guide, perspectives on the aging journey. We are here to be your personal age guide and enhance your quality of life on the road ahead. In this series of our podcast, we want to shine a light on the commitment and dedication of more than 44 million family caregivers in the United States who provide personal assistance to older adults, loved ones, and those with disabilities. These caregivers, also known as informal or unpaid caregivers, make up 21% of the adult population today. Caregiving is a demanding job, and no one is equipped to do it alone. Finding respite care and support can provide a vital break for weary caregivers. Relief can take many forms, from in-home care to daycare centers. It could also come in the form of quality programming to engage the care recipient and feed the soul of the caregiver. In our next episode, we explore a creative program offering just this type of support. We'll interview John and Sandy Miller, co-founders of the Sounds Good Choir, to learn how this unique choir offers respite to caregivers of all ages while helping people with dementia and other disabilities connect to music and artistic expression. We'll also introduce our new caregiver specialist, Caitlin Tolentino, to share the other resources and supports for caregivers. And of course, you'll get to hear clips from the Sounds Good Choir woven throughout the episode. We hope that this leaves you with a song in your heart and a better understanding of the difference caregiver and dementia support programs can make. Let's listen in. We have Jonathan and Sandy Miller here today on the Age Guide podcast, Age Guide Perspectives on the Aging Journey. And tell us a little bit about yourselves individually and how did you get involved with the Sounds Good Choir overall?

SPEAKER_02:

I am a professional choral conductor by training. I've been singing in choirs ever since I was nine years old. I was the founder of a professional, high-end professional choir called Chicago Acapella, which I was part of for 27 years and retired from that a couple of years ago. So I've been in choirs my whole life. And Sandy and I had a very difficult year in 2015 where each one of us lost a parent. There were some other losses in our family, and I was working in music publishing, and at the end of that year, I lost my job. And it was very difficult. But because we've been in choirs our whole lives, we had met some people from a remarkable choir in Washington, D.C., called Encore Creativity, which began the whole movement specifically of choirs for old older adults. And we had met them. I had written a piece of music, which they had performed back in 2012. And they said to us, you know, if you ever want to bring this idea to Chicago, we would love that. So we thought, yeah, you know, maybe in 15 years when we're retired, we'll do that. Well, suddenly there was a need and because I needed a job. And Sandy said to me, you know, John, really think about what you want to do with your career. And I said to her, I really want to bring this older adult choir thing to Chicago. And so I'll turn it over to Sandy because her role is indispensable in our success. So tell Nick about you.

SPEAKER_03:

Thanks. I'm a clinical psychologist who has been in private practice for the last 30 or 35 years. I have an office in Hinsdale. And I'm continuing to do practice even as I'm now working full time for Sounds Good Choir. To add on to what Jonathan was saying, you know, that the year of 2015, as he said, was an incredibly difficult year for us. And as is often the case, I think when we go through times that are so, so, you know, so challenging, it brings things into perspective, you know, and I said to Jonathan, you know, Life is short, clearly. That's been part of the lesson this year. And you have an opportunity here with a job that you need to do. Take a look at what you want to do that has meaning and purpose and perhaps is the thing that you're meant to do in this world. And the choir organization just popped up immediately. So I said to John, we're not gonna starve. You can take a year to think it over. And by the end of the year, you probably need to be doing something. And he had an answer within a couple of months and said, let's do that choir thing that we always dreamed about doing when we retire. So here we are. Also, in addition to... Those two jobs of being a psychologist and the program director for our dementia choirs, I also am a deacon in the Episcopal Church. And in the Episcopal world, that's an ordained clergy position. So that also ties together with the work that we're doing because I really feel that it is God's work that we're doing with our choirs. So 2015 was that really difficult year And in early 2016, we started our first two choirs in Hyde Park and Evanston. Those were our first two locations.

SPEAKER_02:

They were six-week pilots.

SPEAKER_03:

Six-week pilots. By the end of the six weeks, we were rolling and decided to have two more choirs. And six weeks after that, we went from four choirs to six choirs, which brought us to summer of 2016 when Jonathan ran into a colleague of his at a conference.

UNKNOWN:

Oh, right.

SPEAKER_03:

and who told Jonathan about an organization on which he was serving on their board. And the organization was called Giving Voice. Giving Voice in the Twin Cities, Minneapolis, St. Paul is the organization whose mission is to help create choirs for people with dementia singing alongside their care partners. Jonathan heard about this organization, came home from the conference and said, Sandy, I just heard about this amazing organization in the Twin Cities. I think we ought to go up. and take a look at them as if we didn't have enough to do. We're running six brand new choirs with, I don't know, a couple hundred singers scattered all over the Chicago area. And the last thing we needed to do on this earth was to go look at another choir possibility, but we did. In October of 16, we went up to Minneapolis, spent a day with the Giving Voice Organization and literally, On the way home in the airplane, we pulled out our laptop and tried to put together the beginning of a budget because those choirs for people with dementia and their care partners felt to us like something we just simply had to do. Like there was no option, really.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, and what got us interested was my friend Brian Newhouse, who's up in the Twin Cities. He said, what's amazing about this choir is that After you've been there for 30 or 45 minutes, the people with memory loss, their brains start to wake up and the singing switches them on. And he said, for the rest of the rehearsal, you can't tell who has dementia and who doesn't. And you, there's no way to know this other than you got to come see it. So I was like, okay, sign us up. Let's go. And we cried all day. It was one of the most beautiful things we'd ever seen. Neither Sandy or I had any background with dementia. We don't have dementia in our family. So, you know, and Sandy's.

SPEAKER_03:

My clinical practice is with children and adolescents, you know, totally different, you know, age on the

SPEAKER_02:

age. Yeah. And I've mostly worked with professional singers and only, you know, I spent some time doing church music with volunteer singers and synagogue music, but So this is a whole different experience for us. But he was right.

SPEAKER_03:

And in our life now, we see that all the time. We see exactly that, you know, that our singers, you know, spend the rehearsal with us. And by the end of the rehearsal, they are cognitively and behaviorally in a very different place than they were when they walked in.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. And Age Guide, you know, thank you all so much. You are supporting that. Yes. That program financially. Part of what happened is you told us that's actually how we got to know you at Age Guide. Because right around the time Sandy came up with the idea to do a pilot of this Zoom-based sing-along, we met Colette Jordan from your staff, who told us that all the memory cafes in person had gone away. Of course, because nothing was happening in person at that time, and there was nothing happening. in terms of musical or arts-related programming for people with dementia. It was just gone. So they were really looking for someone to partner with who could create something. And we were

SPEAKER_03:

in the middle of trying to invent it.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, and we were incredibly fortunate in that Paul Langford from our conducting staff and Kelsey Cox from our And the administrative staff were brilliant and really on the cutting edge of what technology could do for people. And so we just rode that wave and asked them to keep coming up with great ideas about technology. And then the content really helped. So those programs continue.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. And so the sing-alongs offered once a week, all year long.

SPEAKER_02:

Fridays at 1 p.m. And anybody who's listening to this podcast who wants to be part of the Good Memories Sing-Along Cafe. Yes. All you have to do is go to soundsgoodchoir.org and click on the link for the Good Memories Cafe, sign up, fill out a simple online survey. We'll get you in the database and Age Guide will give us your information. We'll add you to the group. And every Thursday, you'll get an email with the name of the topic and who's leading it from our conducting team and the Zoom link because it changes every week based on who's conducting it. And you get to go sing for an hour of fun.

SPEAKER_03:

And it's free.

SPEAKER_04:

Oh the weather outside is frightful But the fire is so delightful And since we've no place to go Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow Oh the weather outside is frightful But the fire is so delightful And since we've no place to go Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow Over a dozen show signs are stopping And I brought some more for popping The lights have turned way down low Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow And we finally kissed goodnight I hate going out in the storm But if you really hold me tight All the way home I'll be warm Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow. When we finally kiss goodnight, how I hate going out in the snow. But if you really hold me tight, all the way home I'll be warm. slowly dying and my dear was still defying but as long as you love me so let it snow let it snow let it snow let it snow sleigh bells ring are you listening in the lane A beautiful sight, we're happy tonight Walking in a winter wonderland Gone away is the bluebird Here to stay is the new bird He sings a love song as we go along Walking in a winter wonderland In the meadow we can build a snowman and pretend that he is Parson Brown.

UNKNOWN:

He'll say, are you married? We'll say, no, man. But you can do the job when you're in town. But you can do the job when you're in town. And your aunt will conspire as we dream by the fire. Walking in a winter wonderland To face unafraid the plans that we made Walking in a

SPEAKER_00:

Hi everyone. My name is Caitlin Torrentino. I am the caregiver and dementia specialist at Age Guide Northeastern Illinois. My role at the agency is to oversee and monitor all the services for persons with dementia and family caregivers. So just one example of that is the family caregiver support program, which is for unpaid family caregivers. An unpaid caregiver is Thank you so much for joining us. A very, very large issue that I often run into in my work is that unpaid family caregivers often do not self-identify because they're just doing what is necessary for their parent or their other loved one. But if you assist with driving someone to their doctor's appointments, running errands for them, cooking, cleaning, paying bills, dressing, bathing, or assisting with their medications, then you are a caregiver. There are different categories of caregivers. For example, there are unpaid caregivers that are taking care of older adults over the age of 60. There are unpaid caregivers for loved ones with dementia, which includes Alzheimer's disease. There are grandparents raising grandchildren. And then there are also unpaid caregivers for a loved one with a severe disability. According to a 2022 AARP Illinois survey, there are nearly 1.5 million caregivers who provide about 1.24 billion hours of unpaid care each year. From a monetary perspective, that's about$17 billion worth of care. And when performing their caregiver responsibilities, unpaid caregivers spend an average of$7,242 each year on care for their loved one. Not unsurprisingly, caregivers face several different challenges such as high stress levels, burnout, balancing work and their caregiving responsibilities, financial stress, and having no personal time to themselves to pursue their own interests. And those are just the ones that I can name off the top of my head right now. There's a short list of caregiver challenges, and there are so many more that I could discuss other than those examples. In this podcast episode, you just heard from John and Sandy Miller, who are the CEOs for the Sounds Good Choir. This choir is just one of the many valuable caregiver resources available to support unpaid caregivers. Thank you so much for joining us. For instance, if a caregiver doesn't participate with their loved one, the sessions still provide the caregiver with an opportunity for some respite. They drop off their loved one to the Sounds Good Choir and they can go run their errands. They can go to their own doctor's appointments and things such as that. Respite is defined as short-term relief for unpaid caregivers, so things like I just talked about. And because the sessions for the choir are regularly scheduled week to week, it does give caregivers the chance to have some time to themselves, whether that be to kind of do their own hobbies, go work out, do some much-needed grocery shopping, etc. Having that time to mentally and physically recharge benefits both the caregiver and the care receiver. In addition to the Sounds Good Choir, Age Guide, in partnership with other agencies, offers many other caregiver support services that include caregiver resource centers, the T-Care assessment, gap-filling services, and Thank you so much for joining us. Age Guide highly encourages accessing the services that I just touched on because they do exist for a reason. They're beneficial to the caregiver and, by extension, the care receiver. In order to inquire about those services, please call Age Guide at 630- 293-5990 or email info at ageguide.org. Again, info at

SPEAKER_04:

ageguide.org. Hail the blessed Lord, see the great mediator, Bound from the regions of glory descend.

UNKNOWN:

Shepherds go worship the baby, the manger, Glow for his power, the bright angels ascend.

SPEAKER_04:

Brightest and best of the stars of the morning, Dawn on our darkness and land as thy name.

UNKNOWN:

Star in the east of the horizon adorning, Thy terror infantry deeper is laying.

SPEAKER_04:

Thank you.¶¶¶¶

UNKNOWN:

Oh,

SPEAKER_01:

As like I said, this podcast, you know, is a part of a series on caregivers and we know that many caregivers are carrying with someone dementia or other memory issues and H got obviously funds these projects in part to support these caregivers and the choir and the caregiving kind of go together. Is there some stories that you've heard from different caregivers, even ones that participate and ones that just kind of go off and have that respite? Have you heard any stories stories that you can tell that maybe other people could hear and echo along to others to say, hey, this is something that might work for you in these situations.

SPEAKER_03:

One of our care partners was talking about that yesterday, particularly talking with Jonathan about it, that he comes in and just is able to kick back and not having to plan. It's like an hour and a half of his week where he isn't the one who has to make the plans and run everything for he and his wife.

SPEAKER_02:

And at the same time, it's not adult daycare. And there's a huge role in the world. Thank God for adult daycare because sometimes you just need to take your person to some place where they're going to be safe and you can go home and take a nap or take a shower or cry or go to the store or get a haircut or whatever. And that's incredibly important. But this is different. And one of the differences, if you also need respite, go get respite. We're saying this to the care partners who are listening to this podcast. Please take care of yourself. Get respite. Find out all the support systems that you have from Age Guide and from everywhere else and from your family and friends and loved ones. Get the support that you need because respite is absolutely essential. And the Good Memories Choir model which we have now implemented in two locations um is what's one of the things that's so cool about it is that there are three kinds of people in that choir other than the conductor obviously there are people with memory loss there are care partners and the care partner could be a spouse a could be a family member, could be a friend, could be a paid caregiver. And we have all kinds of people who, I think people actually in every- We

SPEAKER_03:

have every, yeah, one in all

SPEAKER_02:

of those. All of those currently. And volunteer singers, most of whom sing in our other Sounds Good choirs and really believe in this model, They were trained by Dan Kuhn, the wonderful dementia educator from Altrust Home Care. He's been in the field for 40 years. Brilliant. And so they had a half day training with him about how do you interact socially in a supportive and kind and compassionate way with someone who has dementia and with a care partner also. So so We've got people with memory loss. We've got their care partners and we've got the volunteers all singing together. Everybody has a name tag and nobody knows who's who. So it doesn't say I'm Bill and I have dementia. It just says I'm Bill. And it doesn't say I'm Georgiana and I'm a care partner. So sometimes people have said to us, I didn't know that person had dementia because that's not what's important. We're all there together. because it's an environment that's there to support people with dementia and their care partners. And one of the reasons we say care partners instead of caregivers is that the care partners need care too. It's not just a one-way street and the care partners come to us and often they are exhausted and they are tapped out and they tell us, this is the only 90 minutes of the week that we don't have to plan.

SPEAKER_03:

Right, this is the only time we go out of the house that it's not going to a doctor appointment.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. And I just talked to a spouse yesterday who said, you know, I take my wife to the symphony, I take her to theater, but this is the only place where we really go and she's doing something active and she's interacting with other people. The only thing. They've moved to a new retirement facility and they are isolated. She's just not able to... you know, to engage and interact. And it's heartbreaking. And it shows us that this program is really filling a need.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, sometimes it was so funny yesterday. One of the people with dementia said, you know, because we're coming up to a performance. We've got a big concert next week. And I said, you know, I joke, watch the conductor and your whole life works. You know, it's not just that you get that the music doesn't fall apart, but you really have to watch the conductor. So one of the women said to me, it's a good thing you're so handsome because otherwise I wouldn't want you at all you know it was so

SPEAKER_03:

funny totally flushed and turned around Yeah, and they tease him.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it's really funny.

SPEAKER_03:

One of our women with dementia yesterday got so excited that she said, I feel like doing cartwheels. And she's close to 90 years old, and I don't think that's such a great idea.

SPEAKER_02:

So I said, I'm not very good at doing cartwheels, but if anyone here wants to do a cartwheel, do a cartwheel.

SPEAKER_03:

So joy really is an important part of our agenda.

UNKNOWN:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

we were talking about care partners and their experience. And I just wanted to say, to add something about our choir. As Jonathan mentioned, people don't have labels in our choir. We're not saying I'm care partner or I'm a person with dementia, but there is a sense, a strong sense when we're all there that we're all in this together. And, and I think, you know, for the, for the care partners, particularly, I think they feel that connection and they feel that, that awareness that they're among people who are going through the same kind of, you know, difficulties, um, and hopefully joys, but difficulties and challenges, um, you know, that there are people, kindred spirits there who share that life experience with them. And it's one of those unstated, you know, phenomenon that just exists in our choir. And I think there's a way in which some of, I can see it in some of our care partners, they come in and not only do they know that here's an hour and a half where they're kind of off duty, You know, sometimes they don't even sing. They just sit there and hopefully relax. But, you know, for that hour and a half, they're in a place where, where we all get it.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes. Their person is safe. Their person is loved. Their person is cared for. There's no judgment. Yeah. And there's no judgment and there's no stigma. And we almost actually never talk about dementia. Exactly. Because you don't have to because

SPEAKER_03:

everybody gets it. It's known already. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

And that's one of the things that's so cool. It's that

SPEAKER_03:

intangible, you know, kind of emotional atmosphere that, you know, just gets created by virtue of what we're doing.

SPEAKER_01:

Now that we have learned about our guests and who they are, we want them to walk up the steps, grab a microphone, and get on our Age Stage. This segment allows a soapbox-like platform to speak to the aging community on any topic they want to shine a light on. In this Age Stage, Jonathan and Sandy talk about the importance of research and the impact choirs have on people with dementia. Let's listen in. but we're also going to kind of go to a quick segment that kind of envelops a lot of what I just said, which is called the age stage. And normally at the end of every interview, we normally allow people to get up on our age stage and talk about whatever they really want to. And we want to, you know, as much as we've heard a lot about your passions and stuff like that, we really want to hear about, you know, the nitty gritty of something maybe that you want to change in society or whatever, whatever that really is, you know, I'm going to, put that spotlight on you, give you a mic and just let you have that. And we'll start that conversation now. So what is something that you want to say on this age stage?

SPEAKER_03:

Yay. Yay for that. So I guess I'm speaking more from my role as clinical psychologist now. And one of the things that many people don't know about the training of a clinical psychologist is that the doctoral degree in clinical psych is at its core is a research degree. We are trained to be researchers and often the statisticians in medical center research teams are clinical psychologists. So even though most of us go into clinical work, as I did and see patients for many years, in our heart of hearts, we are still researchers. So as soon as we started our choirs, particularly our choirs for people with dementia, I have felt a pull to contribute to the scientific literature, which is pretty scant at this point. You know, Anecdotally, you know, the things we've been talking about, anecdotally, we see this every day. You know, we see the effect that music has on our singers. And yet there's not a ton of, you know, scientific, you know, research to document that.

SPEAKER_02:

A really well-designed, rigorous research.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, it's hard to do. And there are probably lots of other reasons that it isn't there. But yeah. after about four years of trying to put together the right team of people to help me with that goal, I'm happy to say that we will be beginning a research project in fall of 2023, that is a collaboration with the Northwestern Meslin Alzheimer's Center with some input and collaboration from a team from Rush as well from their Alzheimer's Center. And the principal investigator of this study, the lead guy of what we call our dream team, is Dr. Borna Banakdarpur, who's a neurologist at Northwestern at their Alzheimer's Center. And we will be studying with a pilot study. And a pilot study is a first step in trying to figure out the best way to research this question. And so we're going to be looking at you know, wanting to document the positive effects of singing in a choir for people with memory loss and also in the broader world for older adults as a whole. So we're very excited about that. It took four years to put together just the right group of people. And I'm excited that we have that team and so excited about these colleagues. I mean, they are like just amazingly talented researchers and super great human beings. So I'm honored to be, to have us working with them and to be part of, you know, part of that team.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. They've worked together before on several projects. They, they, they really know what they're doing and that's been fun to work out the research methodology. You know, anytime you, anytime you do a research project at the university level with human subjects, you have to bring it before what's called the institutional review board. And, and we've made it, our project has been approved by, by the IRB, which has a exciting so we can really start to roll up our sleeves and plan for that.

SPEAKER_03:

So we'll begin our data collection in late summer of 2023 and finish the data collection for that project in December of 2023 and then hopefully be looking at places to publish that in the scientific journals, the medical journals.

SPEAKER_02:

These are online surveys that our constituents will be filling out a month before and then right at the beginning of the program and then at the end, and then we'll look at the data and see what happens. So

SPEAKER_03:

anyone participating in our choirs during that fall session, which begins in September, anyone participating in our choirs is eligible to be part of the study. It's open to anyone who's singing with

SPEAKER_02:

us. Yeah, and for people in the age guide area, that's our choirs in Downers Grove and Wheaton. So if people want to be part of, in addition to singing, which is a lot of fun, if people want to be part of a research project documenting the impact of of choral singing on any number of health measures, jump on in.

SPEAKER_03:

And at the same time, if someone just wants to sing with us and research isn't their bag, that's totally okay too.

SPEAKER_01:

Super fun. Absolutely. And it's from an angle that I didn't think about. Y'all have actually this wonderful focus group, which is really amazing. It's not only that, not only are you bringing someone to a very special place where there's that release, that group therapy feeling that musical attunement to the world, you actually are contributing to something that might push the dial just a little bit further of us kind of looking in what's actually cognitively happening and what maybe people should be kind of participating in to kind of deflect these effects from happening, regardless of if it's going to happen or not to them.

SPEAKER_03:

Absolutely. Absolutely. And to confide in you sort of my secret agenda about

SPEAKER_01:

this. Oh, I'm excited. Let's get this going.

SPEAKER_03:

Not some secret. In the British Isles right now, if someone is in Scotland, in England, if someone is diagnosed with dementia, they automatically receive from their physician what they call a social prescription. They get a prescription to go sing in a choir, for example. Their physician says, here's what I want you to do. Maybe they give it on their prescription pad. I don't know. But I, your doctor, want you to go sing in a choir because we know it's good for you. So my secret hope is that we can get to that point in our country as well so that Everybody who's diagnosed with dementia hears from their physician. We know this is good for you.

SPEAKER_02:

Go do this. In fact, in Scotland, where they have a mandate from the government to do this, they're in the process of building a whole network of dementia-friendly choirs

SPEAKER_03:

because

SPEAKER_02:

they got all these people with dementia and they've got these social prescriptions. Someone's got to do something about it. Exactly.

SPEAKER_03:

And we would need many more choirs in our country as well. But that would be a happy... Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01:

It's great to hear that all of this stuff is kind of working at once. It has this overall effect that is kind of happening. It's happening on the psychological end to kind of push things a little bit more. It's giving that either connection or that respite care or that gap filling service that really allows someone to go away and kind of do their own thing or actually get closer and closer to somebody. And it also allows that those coping skills to be learned the music and everything like that and then overall it's just such a beautiful program it's one of my favorites here at age guide that really connects people together and you guys again are doing some great work and it was amazing talking to you and if you can just kind of give again a little bit more information on where to find yourself just if you could talk to the caregivers and all the people that are listening now could you give them a little bit more info about where and when to find you

SPEAKER_02:

Sure. If you want to learn more about our programs, go to our website, which is soundsgoodchoir.org. If you're interested in the Good Memories Sing-Along, which is every Friday from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. for people with memory loss and their care partners, you can sign up for free for that. If you are interested in the Good Memories Choir, you can go on our website again, look at Good Memories Choir. The sing-alongs go every week, 52 weeks a year on Friday. The Good Memories Choir is having concerts. All of our choirs are having concerts in December, and then we take a break and we'll start again the end of January, beginning of February. But just go to soundsgoodchoir.org. All the information is right there. It's spelled just like it sounds. Soundsgoodchoir, C-H-O-I-R. If you want to come to our concert, just know you'll need to bring your Vax card and your mask, but it's super fun. Singing with a mask actually is not as bad as it sounds. And there are singers' masks. You can find them online and that makes it more fun too. But just go to soundsgoodchoir.org and you can learn all about that.

SPEAKER_01:

Absolutely. And thank you, Jonathan and Sandy, for coming in and talking with me today. And like I said, everyone that's heard this, you have this information in front of you. Please use it. Please share it around. Please make sure that it goes to the right people that will be a part of this. And also people that are musical out there that want to help out, want to volunteer. It doesn't just have to be, oh, dementia this or dementia that or Alzheimer's. You could just be a musician who wants to help out and wants to sing and maybe grab someone's hand and take them to that place. So thank you very much for being here. And I hope you guys have a great one. Thank you for listening to The Age Guide, Perspectives on the Aging Journey. We hope you learned something new on this podcast because we all have a stake in promoting a high quality of life for people on their aging journey. Age Guide coordinates and administers many services for older adults in Northeastern Illinois. We serve DuPage, Grundy, Kane, Kankakee, Kendall, Lake, McHenry, and Will Counties. Our specially trained professionals are available to answer questions and connect you with local service providers and resources. In addition to the Sounds Good Choir, Age Guide in partnership with other agencies offers many other caregiver support services that include access to counseling, legal services, training, and support groups, as well as financial assistance for supportive services such as respite care. All of these services are tailored to each unique caregiver based on an individual assessment called TCARE. If you are interested in these services or want to learn more, go to our website at ageguide.org. Call our offices at 630-293-5990. Please follow our podcast so when we post our monthly podcast, you are notified on your streaming account. Thank you, and we will see you next time on The Age Guide, Perspectives on the Aging Journey.