You might be familiar with my Facebook page, Dana Andrews (https://www.facebook.com/iamdanaandrews/). It is a safe haven where we find courage, compassion, hope, empathy, and healing. It is a place where almost 1,700 survivorshelp one another learn to deal with the heinous treatment we endured at the hands of our abusers. It's an environment of comfort where we learn to find the beauty within our own souls. There is no better place to be; when you are already at the bottom, the only place left to go is upward!

One of the many perks of liking this Facebook page (in addition to getting to know other survivors) is that it is free! You have nothing to lose, yet so much to gain! So how did this all begin? 

Recently I flew from Las Vegas to Phoenix. When passing through the security line I was delayed while they searched my handbag. Knowing they'd find nothing suspicious, I casually suggested to the 2 TSA agents rifling through my bag, "Should you find anything I don't need, please feel free to discard it!"

How many of us saddle ourselves with much more than we need? This question applies to more than material baggage. We're talking emotional baggage here

None of us knew we could ever be extraordinary. In fact, we thought ourselves a burden and unworthy.

We found ourselves in a place where we silenced both our instincts and our screams. We wanted to shed our skin, wipe away our horror, leave the lights on all night long, and be anywhere but where we were.

I recently decided to take a hiatus from my job. Actually, it was more a passion than it was a job. I had the privilege of helping to turn victims of sexual assault into survivors.  At all hours of the day and night, they came, every age, from every walk of life, to find a way to make sense of what happened and learn how to move forward. Always, I assured them they had done the right thing to seek treatment. They could become whole again. They never asked for this heinous assault to happen, but the gift of time (and if desired, therapy) would make them stronger. Such a wondrous, yet exhausting endeavor for both victim and nurse alike.

Assault nursing can drain one's soul if you let it. I believe that in my 8 years of SANE nursing I made a difference for many. For each victim I had between 2 and 5 hours to listen to their story, examine them, gather evidence, medicate them and find a way to help them see that tomorrow would come, and they would be able to walk away from their horrid assault with their integrity and personhood relatively intact. I would always show them every bit of mercy my heart held.