Table A2.
Excerpts from the analysis of interviews with six children and their parents after receiving music therapy. Participants included: A, post-HSCT; B, during HSCT; C, during HSCT; D, post-HSCT; E, during HSCT; F, post HSCT. Music therapist is abbreviated as T. Verbal testimonies are in italics and the interviewer’s memories of interactions are in ordinary text.
| 1. How was it to be involved in music therapy? |
| 1.1. Musicality was evoked |
| Mother: We noticed in A, A loves music. (A) |
| Laughter during interview when listening to recordings from the MT sessions. (B) |
| Mother: I am moved when C tells us this. (C) |
| Mother: When we came home, D wanted a guitar. D got more interested in music. (D) |
| During the interview, participants shared memories through singing together. (E) |
| Mother: I myself like music, we sing in church. (F) |
| 1.2. Monotonous isolation was broken |
| Mother: The thing was that we got away from it, A could leave the room. (A) |
| Child: I got cheerful, happy when T came into my room. (C) |
| Mother: Asked after each session, when is next. (D) |
| Father: When T came, E wanted to leave E’s mom and that was fun for all of us. (E) |
| 1.3. A “sense of normality” was evoked |
| Mother: A became revived, could come out—it was life in it. (A) |
| Mother: B had a positive experience, felt better, became less gloomy. B breathed more freely. (B) |
| Mother: After C sang together with T, C experienced it [the treatment] differently. (C) |
| Mother: all of us got happy, [sibling] too. Joy, happy, to feel alive. (F) |
| 1.4. Child’s competencies were activated |
| Mother: A got a task and purpose. (A) |
| During the interview, B played recordings of the songs B made together with T and expressed in head nods that it was familiar for B to sing songs and that it felt safe for B to sing. (B) |
| Mother: It was good that B could decide/suggest. (B) |
| Child: When I sang with T, I forgot the pain. (C) |
| 1.5. Music therapy offered pain diversion |
| Mother: Became easier [for B] to breathe. It affected the senses. (B) |
| Child: When I met T in MT I forgot the pain. (C) |
| Father: E became happy, and at the same time very tired. (E) |
| 1.6. Music therapy evoked regulation of different kinds of affects |
| Mother about B: Easier to breathe, affected B’s mind. It was like T captured when B was enclosed a clam like. (B) |
| Child: I felt joy when T entered my room. I love music. (C) |
| Mother: We felt safe and happy after each MT session. (D) |
| Father: When they have fun, I also feel happy. Mother: It helped me to see them happy, [because] it was very hard. (E) |
| Mother: F became happier, F smiled at once. We all became happy. (F) |
| 2. How was it to play music in this way? |
| 2.1. Music therapy activated bodily sensations and affects |
| Mother: A felt happy, A recognized, longed [for MT]. It was fun. How it felt in the body. (A) |
| B smiled and nodded during interview. Father confirmed that B felt safe. (B) |
| Mother: D got more interested, happy after each meeting. D shows during interview: “aha!” you can do this! (D) |
| Father: It was great fun, E became happy. It was fun for all of us. (E) |
| Mother: That half hour, was very fun, F liked, danced. (F) |
| 2.2. Emergence of interactive regulation |
| Father and B conveyed that it suited B, it was familiar to B to play and sing, B knew many songs before. Father expressed that the familiar became safe for B. (B) |
| Child: I noticed that the pain was affected, I could also listen. (C) |
| During interview, D showed a video on the iPhone from one MT session, and conveyed that it was fun and important. (D) |
| Mother: When T learned a song from our native country, F started to dance, it evoked something. (F) |
| 3. What was the best/the worst? |
| 4. Is there anything special you remember from when you played, sang, improvised? |
| 3, 4 Evoked positive experiences also contrasted with the longing for more sessions |
| Mother: It was fun to play together. T always took her time. We felt recognized. We felt remembered, one is a human being. One feels warmth in heart. (A) |
| Father: I remember when we wrote songs, it was nice interplay. B revived, felt confident in her/him self. It was laughter, hilariousness. (B) |
| Child: Remember once we could not do anything [play, due to too much pain], did not feel good when she left. Once, in the shower the pain went down when I started to sing. (C) |
| Mother: D felt sad the last time. Then D got more aroused. It was too short. (D) |
| Father: Noticed that E became happier, that E and E’s sibling played together and that sibling helped E to play. Sibling waited for T all the time. Every second day would have been better. (E) |
| Mother: Once, new energy when Fs uncle came. Relatives [from…] took part. (F) |
| 5. How was it to get music therapy during the HSCT/after HSCT? |
| 5. The experienced period was appreciated |
| Mother: We found it was best as it was. (A) |
| Father: Better during HSCT, a break in the room. Mother: 100% best—if not, we had not created/written those songs! (B) |
| Child: It was best during HSCT, it was when I needed it. (C) |
| Mother: It was best after HSCT, D had more strength. (D) |
| Mother: Perhaps better during HSCT. Mother expressed it would have felt better when the child was small. We are one. (F) |
| 6. The therapist’s perspective: Ad hoc questions formulated when meeting the child and parents. |
| 6. Mutuality and sharing in the collaboration |
| Recollects A’s musicality with many songs of A’s own. Mother and Father met A, A engaged them. (A) |
| B does not speak but shows a positive face and nods. B and Father convey that it suited B very well, it was familiar to B to sing, B knew many songs before. Father thinks that the familiar became safe for B. (B) |
| Recollects C’s curiosity, and that they made music together. Remembers that C had pain, and now asks how it was for C to play in spite of pain. (C) |
| Recollects the family as four strongly tight together. A lot of energy. Sibling, when E was tired, played, and it was good for E. Sibling helped E to become interested, helped the little sibling. T sometimes felt she interrupted. E was in the music together with E’s sibling. They really interacted, interplayed. (E) |
| T and F meet each other through playing together for a while, since F immediately turns towards the instruments that F recognizes from the MT sessions. T remembers it being simple, F’s positive expectancies and desire to be with the music. T also remembers that mother supported through her personality and way of engaging. It was helpful to the T. (F) |
| When T and D meet, they reconnect nonverbally and remain in interactive musicking during the interview, without any verbal dialogue. The meeting seemed like a continuation of their former process. D, through verbal statements from the mother, conveyed that the music therapy was too short. (D) |