Growing up in a family of nurses, Ashley McAree, RN, FNE-A/P, CFN, knew from a young age that she was interested in a nursing career. But it wasn’t until she was working as a psychiatric nurse on GBMC’s Medical Psychiatric Unit that she made an eye-opening connection: many of her patients had a history of being sexually assaulted or abused in childhood. The issues seemed so pervasive that Ashley wondered if working with patients during their healing process, right after an attack, might prevent future victims from ending up in a psychiatric unit down the road. “My supervisor at the time was a Sexual Assault Forensic Examination (SAFE) nurse and she encouraged me to go through SAFE training myself,” Ashley said. “That’s when I knew it was my calling and it truly became my passion.”