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After months of closure due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Dawn Adult Day Center at Lakewood Ranch was filled with conversation and laughter on December 1.

Some customers sit in a circle and play games together. Every time a ball is thrown at a customer, they must say a country that has not been mentioned before. 

At the same time, another group of customers sat quietly together after a few months.

Dorothy Prileau of Parrish, a customer of Daybreak, can’t wait to open the center again. During the pandemic, she was reading, watching TV and talking on the phone every day, and her friend Barbara Roberge was also Dawn’s client.

The Meals on Wheels Plus at Manatee’s Daybreak Adult Day Center provides seniors with a safe and secure environment. They live at home with their loved ones, but cannot be alone when the caregiver is working or assuming other responsibilities.

Daybreak Adult Day Center is the only licensed adult day center in Manatee County.

The day center provides clients with social, entertainment and therapeutic activities.

Some activities include fitness and flexibility, games, music, arts and crafts, bingo games and diary writing.

The daytime center is open from Monday to Friday from 7:30 am to 5 pm.

The registration fee is $12 per hour, which includes all supplies, snacks and meals. Provide partial and full-day registration.

Meals on Wheels Plus can provide transportation services for USD 15 per way.

For more information, please call 748-3001.

"I miss my friends here, especially Barbara," Prilo said. "We will keep in touch over the phone, but this is not the same as sitting with her every week."

Prileau said she was "very happy, very happy, happier" to be back to dawn.

Daybreak Adult Daycare Center is the only licensed adult daycare center in Manatee County. It opened for the first time on December 1 since the center began to close on March 20, 2020 due to the pandemic.

"I woke up this morning and I just said,'I can't believe this day is finally here,'" said Maribeth Phillips, President and CEO of Meals on Wheels Plus at Manatee, which provides Daybreak Adult Day Center. "It's been a long time."

Meals on Wheels Plus tried to open a day center in September, but the delta variant of COVID-19 is spreading, so the non-profit organization delayed the reopening.

Another factor in which entry into the center did not open until December 1st is that customers request to come to the center.

Each client needs to obtain a doctor's permission to participate in the day center and tuberculosis vaccination, and they need to sign a COVID-19 waiver.

Daybreak nurse Kim Mullins must also meet with each client.

Now that the facility is open, Meals on Wheels Plus staff are taking additional health and safety precautions at the center, including adding hands-free hand sanitizer, towels and soap dispensers, and performing temperature checks before customers who are transported to the center get on the car Bus and air purifier.

All volunteers and staff at Daybreak Adult Day Center have been vaccinated against COVID-19.

Phillips said that walking into Dawn and seeing customers having fun, it feels like the center has never been closed.

"It's like where we left," Phillips said. "I call this a happy place, and I think that customers who come here feel that this is a happy place. Even before the COVID, it always felt like a fun atmosphere."

Prileau said she couldn't wait to start arts and crafts again. Her house still displays some of the objects she created in art and handicrafts, including spoon racks in the kitchen, wooden dolls on the table in the family room, and silhouettes of seahorses filled with shells.

"I never think of myself as an artistic person," Pulillo said. "I'm more of a musician. I like singing. It's nice to see the fruits of my labor. It's very special."

Dawn volunteer Toni Muirhead said the center is an underutilized gem.

"This is friendship," Muirhead said. "The people who volunteered with me became friends. The people here are very concerned."

Although the Liming Adult Day Center only had about 10 customers when it opened, Phillips said that the staff had received dozens of calls inquiring about the center, and the staff had been visiting the center. The center is approved to have 100 customers, with one staff member for every 6 customers.

Phillips said: "This is a very important plan, not only for the relatives who come, but also for the caregivers." "This is a very important plan to give (caregivers) a break and let them know about them. 'S relatives are well taken care of, they come here to have a good time, and they also get nourishment because they get the same meals we provide to our family customers."

Phillips said that the opening of Daybreak marks the non-profit organization's return to normal and pre-pandemic period.

Phillips said: "I do feel that things are opening up, which is why now is a good time to open the dawn."

The next step for non-profit organizations is to start Friendship Dining again. The suspension of Friendship Dining due to COVID-19 gives people over 60 years of age the opportunity to gather to dine together, enjoy company, activities and nutritious meals.

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