Dahlila Visits the Beehive Assisted Living Home
The Beehive home is an assisted living home in Kanab which has approximately 15 residents. Best Friends has taken dogs to visit the residents in the past but no one is currently providing that service so I decided that Dahlila would love the job! I asked the trainers and managers in Dogtown about it and everyone thought it was a great idea! Pat Whitacre reassessed Dahlila just to make sure that she would tolerate all kinds of handling and she passed with flying colors so, last Saturday, we made our way to the Beehive home.
It was a first for both of us since I had never visited before either but I’m sure I was more nervous than Dahlila was! She jumped right out of the car and charged right in and started exploring the place. When we arrived at about 10:30 a.m., there were about 4 residents in the sitting room napping and everyone else appeared to still be in their rooms so Dahlila just did some sniffing. She was not afraid at all and seemed right at home! There were 2 staff members in the home and they were happy to see Dahlila (one of them was cutting up yams for lunch and Dahlila was very interested!).
After about 10 minutes, a few of the residents in the sitting room began to stir so Dahlila and I introduced ourselves. She was so well behaved; I was very proud of her! She loved meeting the residents and they loved meeting her. The residents kept saying what a wonderful and well behaved dog she was and they seemed to really enjoy her company. One of the residents who was in her room reading talked to me for awhile about how much she loved dogs and how they were always around when she was growing up. I told her Dahlila’s story and she couldn’t believe that someone would abandon a dog on the highway – especially a sweet dog like Dahlila!
I think she really enjoyed having Dahlila visit as did all of the other residents we met so Dahlila will go back again soon! Dahlila did not want to leave, of course, but we finally said goodbye after about 45 minutes and returned to the sanctuary. The visit was definitely a successful one!
Story written by caregiver Emily