Tucson pit bull therapy dog opens hearts — and minds

Coco doesn’t discriminate — she visits kids of all ages, college students, folks in nursing homes.

The therapy dog loves them all. It’s a nice lesson in tolerance, especially since Coco is a pit bull.

When owner Vickie Healey decided to go through therapy-dog training with Coco, she braced herself. “We knew with a pit bull, there might be weird looks,” says Healey, a longtime Tucsonan.

But dogs, regardless of the breed, are just like people.

“You’ve got your good people, you’ve got your bad people,” she says. “It’s the same with dogs — you’ve got good dogs and bad dogs.”

Healey and husband, Mike, have had several different dog breeds over their 23-year marriage. Their previous dog was a pit bull mix that they’d found abandoned in the desert while they were out four-wheeling. She was great, and when she died unexpectedly two years ago, Healey knew she needed another one.

“I just like the breed,” says Healey, a retired University of Arizona graduate coordinator. “They always look like they’re smiling.”

Back to homepage

Subscriber Login

Keep reading with a digital access subscription.

Subscribe now

Coco, who’s white and tan with pale-brown eyes to match, wins over any doubters with that ever-present grin and mellow manner.

Healey remembers one nursing-home patient who wasn’t thrilled when Coco first stopped by her room. She told Healey she’d been attacked by dogs. Healey explained that Coco was a therapy dog, but the woman was angry. By the next visit, though, she didn’t mind Coco at all.

Healey and Coco, who turns 2 in June, had only just completed basic puppy-training class when trainer Jeremy Joseph Brown suggested they’d make a good therapy team. Healey — who was eager to find a way to give back to the community — loved the idea. Coco, who loves to fetch and chomp ice cubes, is onboard with anything that gives her an opportunity for pets and belly rubs.

Since gaining their therapy training certification in June, the duo has been volunteering with Gabriel’s Angels and Pet Partners. They keep a packed schedule. Every weekday, Healey and Coco have a volunteering gig that may take them to a Vail middle school, assisted living facilities, the University of Arizona or Casa de los Niños, which is especially near and dear to Healey’s heart. Healey was in foster care until she was 4 years old and then was adopted into an abusive home. “I just feel for the kids who are going through troubled times and don’t have self-esteem,” she says. “I know what they’re going through.”

Healey hopes to earn a higher level of certification that will allow her and Coco to work one-on-one with troubled youths.

And while the goal is to help others, Healey is finding the volunteer work pretty therapeutic herself. “I think my personality’s changed,” she says. “I’m happier. You see your dog and you see this person looking at your dog and smiling, how can you not smile back and be in a good mood?”