Consider This from NPR - Bonus Episode: The Aphasia Choir

Episode Date: February 15, 2025

There are at least two million people in America who have thoughts and ideas they can't put into words. People who have had strokes or traumatic brain injuries often live with aphasia: difficulty using language, both written and spoken. But music mostly originates in the undamaged hemisphere of the brain, and people with aphasia can often sing. Today in our bonus episode, in partnership with the podcast Rumble Strip, we meet a member of The Aphasia Choir of Vermont.For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Email us at [e-mail] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Hey there Consider This listeners, we're back with another Saturday bonus episode for you. It's part of our new series of short-form audio documentaries. It's a story about speech and silence, about loneliness and joy, even small joys, like biting into a peach. So stick around. From NPR, I'm Scott Detro. It's Consider This from NPR. There are at least two million people in America who have thoughts and ideas that they can't

put into words. People who have had strokes or traumatic brain injuries often live with aphasia, difficulty using language, both written and spoken. But music mostly originates in the undamaged hemisphere of the brain, so people with aphasia can often sing. I like to hold it in my arms and keep it company. This is the Aphasia Choir of Vermont, founded more than a decade ago by former speech-language pathologist Karen McPheeters Leary. And today, for our weekly segment of short-form audio documentaries, we are going to meet one of the members of the choir. This story is brought to us by Erica Heilman from the podcast Rumble Strip.

Do I, I think I will know when to come in. That's Anna King getting ready for her solo with the Aphasia Choir of Vermont. Anna has been living with Aphasia for 19 years, struggling with language and with word-finding. We take language utterly for granted. We talk and talk. So what is it like to be someone struggling to find words? And how are they met out in the world of talkers, in a world pretty uncomfortable with silence? Here is a tiny window into Anna's world. Welcome. I was exercising when I had this whole like horrible bike accident then everything changed. I had to learn how to think again, speak again, talk again, get up again. What year were you? 18.

Like I was like three months after I had graduated. I was going to go to UVM for chemistry. But then my life took a different turn. Like there is loneliness, but darkness and lightness, like you can't have one without the other. And I understand that really deeply. Whenever I want you, all I have to do is dream. What are the 18 sort of common ways that people react in moments with people who are struggling to speak?

Don't let them talk. Speak loudly to them. I wish that everyone could be patient. There's something someone wants to say and they're not finding the way to say it. And I'm not guessing it. So there's a silence. What is the silence, the giving up of the guessing, but just being there anyway? What does that mean to the person who can't speak? Yeah. Yeah. You don't get it and you just will try and then fail and you tried. Human kind. Yeah.

And you can be kind. Yeah. What about love? Oh, oh, that really touches me. Yeah, because my parents love me so much. And my dogs love me. And I think I have not experienced, I am kind of not experienced in love,

I am kind of not an experience in love, but I think that that's what Karen does for us. Like it brings us all together. Joy is what you're describing. Yeah. The experience of getting all in a room and singing ha and I think

biting into a peach while walking my dogs like they just got that this life is precious. Every day. Like, you go out and you smell. Yeah. You know? Yeah. On June 2nd, the Aphasia Choir had their 9th performance to a sold-out audience. It was a hit, of course, because the Aphasia Choir is awesome, but also because Karen had the good sense to pick some excellent songs from the 80s. How did your solo go? Good. I think it went good.

I want to hear it. Yeah. Hold on. Anna pulled up the recording on her phone. Hold on. Hold on. Hold the phone. Hold the phone, hold the phone. Ha, ha, ha, ha.

You with the sad eyes Don't be discouraged Oh, I realize it's hard to take courage In a world full of people You can lose sight of it all. The darkness inside you, it make you feel so small. I see your true colors shining through. I see your true colors and that's why I love you, so don't be ashamed.

That was Erika Heilman from the podcast Rumble Strip. She's also a reporter for Vermont Public, where a version of the story previously aired. That story was produced by Erika and this episode was produced by Noah Caldwell and edited by Ashley Brown. Our executive producer is Sammy Yenigan. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Scott DeTro.