Written by the team at The Village at Penn State
Here at The Village at Penn State, before the pandemic, we had families, friends, volunteers, interns and many more people that were here for our residents on a daily basis. Mostly just spending time with them, pampering them, singing, and laughing with them.
When our doors closed to the outside world last year, it was a challenging and emotional time. We saw the change in our residents when they could only see their families through a pane of glass or on a screen and couldn’t understand why they weren’t coming in to visit.
We realized very quickly that as therapists, we were some of the only physical contact and interaction our residents had every day, and we took that responsibility very seriously. We recognized the impact we had on the residents when we came to see them for therapy. With no visits from family to look forward to, they looked forward to their therapists coming to see them every day. A kind word and one-on-one time with them brightened their day during a challenging time.
Over a year later, we are able to open our doors again to families and friends. What a wonderful impact it’s had for our residents here. We will always remember the effect we had when we wore many hats during the pandemic. Therapists, friends, companions, motivators and so much more.
“Hope is being able to see that there is light despite all of the darkness.” – Desmond Tutu
