Woman Befriends Neighbor's Donkey And They End Up Saving Each Other
"She would lay her head on me and just listen to everything. She almost would absorb all my pain."
After Shelbi Hahn and her husband moved to Virginia, one of the first new neighbors she met was Jenny. The sweet donkey belonged to Hahn’s neighbor, and from the moment they met, they had an unexplainable bond.
“When I first met Jenny, I brought her some carrots and sat on a bench they had, and she came right up to me without hesitation,” Hahn told The Dodo.
Not long after meeting Jenny for the first time, Hahn unexpectedly lost her brother. She was unable to travel home and be with her family due to COVID, and it was incredibly difficult to deal with. To distract herself, she often helped her neighbors out by watching over their animals when they weren’t around, and that’s when she and Jenny really started to get close.
“It was like I could sit there and she would lay her head on me and just listen to everything,” Hahn said. “She almost would absorb all my pain, as crazy as that sounds. Every time I would come to visit her, she would let out a big bray (the big yell she does) and it would fill my heart with such joy. The owners would say all the time how much she loved me and how comfortable she was with me.”
Hahn and Jenny’s bond grew stronger every day. They became best friends, and it wasn’t hard for everyone to see just how much they loved each other.
A year after Hahn lost her brother, tragedy struck again when she suffered a miscarriage. Not long after that, Jenny lost both her pasture mate and one of her owners. Both best friends were in a lot of pain, and they grieved together. They found comfort in each other and their friendship — and that’s when Jenny’s remaining owner made a decision.
“Donkeys don’t usually do well on their own, and her owner is older and wasn’t going to be able to keep up with her and get her another companion, so she asked if I would take her since we bonded over so much and we have a small farm with goats and chickens,” Hahn said.
Hahn and her husband immediately agreed, and Jenny officially became a member of their family.
“She’s adapting well and is very interested in the other animals,” Hahn said. “She gives daily hugs to me whenever I kneel down to talk with her, and she continues to bray when she sees me. It’s a connection I cherish and am so grateful we had each other through these really difficult years.”
