I currently volunteer at a local SANE clinic. I feel this is a powerful advocacy and wanted to share about it. :) All of my experience is based on the SANE clinic I volunteer at, and may not be the same everywhere.

What is SANE? SANE stands for "sexual assault nurse exam" and it is what people are actually referring to when they say "rape kit." The purpose of a SANE exam is two fold. One, to gather evidence to potentially bring to trial against a rapist. Two, to provide support for the victim and get her "plugged in" with the resources available.

What does the volunteer do? During a SANE exam, the volunteer's role is to act as a supportive friend. You help provide the victim with emotional support as an empathetic soul but also someone who is prepared to provide trauma-informed care. The end result of this looks a bit like acting like a maid ("Can I get you a drink?" "Would you like floral or vanilla scented shampoo?"), acting like a distraction ("So what are you studying in school?"), acting like a listening ear ("That is so awful that this happened!"), and acting like an educator ("It doesn't matter that you were drunk. Rape is wrong no matter what.")

The volunteer will not participate in any of the medical aspects (prescribing medicine, wound care) and is only rarely involved in evidence collection (helping with the black light, helping take a photo, never actually touching the evidence).

What does an exam look like step by step, from the perspective of the volunteer? We are on call. I do night shifts, so I have my clothes laid out, including key cards. I basically make sure I am fully ready so that I can focus 100% on her once we get going. So I make sure my medical condition is taken care of, I have gas in the car tank, I have a snack, etc. When I get a call, I'll be told by a victim advocate (we're both victim advocates, but this call comes from a professional victim advocate) that patient named Jane will be meeting me with the police at the center at a certain time, usually 30-45 minutes warning.

I hop in the car and wait an hour because police are never on time for anything. If you know what the heck they're doing, please let me know.

The police and the victim arrive, sometimes with a friend or family member. I welcome them into a very comfortable cosy waiting room. I offer them drinks and snacks. I get some basic paperwork done (name, age, address). I let any family or friends know generally how long things typically take, where the bathroom is, and where the TV remote is.

I lead the victim to the actual exam room and introduce the nurse. The nurse will then mostly take over here because she's getting a witness statement. I do more paperwork while the nurse is talking to the victim. The nurse is finding out the nitty gritty details of what happened, because that will guide what she does during the exam. If he bit her wrist, for example, the nurse will try to swab for saliva on her wrist. During this time, the victim may get emotional. This is where I slip back into the conversation to offer support. Some of the nurses also do this, some of them kind of shut down and wait impatiently, if I'm honest. The best ones do something in the middle -- compassionately wait. It helps the victim stay on track and not get lost in their grief to have at least one person who is focused on business.

Once the medical history and victim statement is taken, the victim goes into a bathroom to change into an exam gown and sits on a gynecological exam table. The volunteer sits in a chair by the head of the victim. This is when we start chatting. Sometimes the victim wants to talk more about the trauma. Usually, though, the victim wants to talk about anything else. We talk about school, about our favorite shows, our favorite bands. It's a lot of small talk and the victim is usually eager to eat it up as if it's actually an engaging conversation to her. I can't possibly provide a truly engaging conversation (we just met! I can't know her well enough!) but, in this state, the victim just grabs on to any distraction.

After the exam, the victim gets dressed in the bathroom. I go into our giant closet and find her replacement clothes, as her clothes are often now evidence. I get her soaps such to use so she can take a shower and wash everything away. As she showers, I tend to the linens in the exam room and sanitizing everything. There's more paperwork.

Once the victim is clean and dressed, I gather her side of the paperwork and make sure she knows whats in it. I make sure she knows what to expect from here, trauma wise and also repeating some of what the nurse said (like potential side effects of the STD prevention medicines). I make sure she hears of other resources we offer, like therapy.

I walk the victim to her car and then I come back in and clean the bathroom that she showered in. I file the paperwork and take out the trash. When the nurse is done securing the evidence in the evidence closet, we walk to our cars together and go home.

What kind of person would be good at this? The most important thing is you need to be able to focus 100% on the victim. If you are a person who wanders into talking about themselves, this would not be the best volunteer opportunity for you. Ask your BFF if you tend to do that. You need to have a lot of compassion. You need to be able to control your stomach if things get gross. You need to be able to have at least decent ability at small talk. You need to be able to walk and talk with ease, as that portrays safety to the victim. Unfortunately, someone with social anxiety at meeting new people may also be a poor fit for this opportunity. You have to be able to meet someone and become their BFF at a moment's notice.

What are some potentially unexpected things to be aware of? Though SANE clinics area often funded by "women's shelter", it's not only women who get raped. Occasionally, you'll get a male victim. You have to be just as 100% for the victim if you're told "Please help me hold this leg out of the way while I stitch the labia" or "...while I stitch the scrotum." Trans identifying persons may come in as well, and same deal there. Once they enter, they're victims of rape and you are their best friend, regardless of whatever differences in ideologies you have outside those walls. This isn't the place to use their biological pronouns. You are the victim's servant, in a way, for about 2-3 hours. Having men also have access to SANE exams is a requirement for the clinic to receive federal funding.

Do I need training? Yes. The clinic will be required to have everyone have a certain amount of hours and type of training to receive funding. There is state and federal funding. In my state, I had to do 40 hours of initial training. 20 was in-person during a quarterly training intensive weekend. 20 was online. Every year, I have to have 10 hours of continuing education.

What is the training about if most of the job is just chatting and cleaning? Training enables you to be trauma-informed. This allows you to mitigate the additional trauma that the victim is going through. No matter how kind and caring you are, this exam is apart of the traumatic series of events that this victim is going through. There are very strange things the brain does when in a traumatic event, and it's important for you to know that so that you do not inadvertently contribute to the trauma or contribute to triggers. For example, victims rarely can recall the story in the order that the events happened. A non-trauma informed person may try to gently encourage her to start at the beginning and then say what happened next. That's not how trauma-brain works. On a simpler level, a non-trauma informed person may wear her normal perfume. The victim's brain then may attach significance to that perfume and the victim will, for years to come, have flashbacks of the night whenever she walks by someone wearing that perfume. She likely wont even know why it's happening, and just think it's "random flashbacks."

How can I find a place to volunteer in this way? Google around for your local "sexual assault resource center" or "domestic violence resource center." You wont have as much luck looking for a "women's shelter" as we don't want to advertise the location of the shelter. Also, the shelter is not the best resource we have for most victims. They may or may not say they accept volunteers on the website. That's because this type of volunteering is... I'm not sure the best way to describe it, but I think of it as "professional volunteering." It's not like a soup kitchen where you show up and then you don't come back. Here, I'm given a schedule. They trust me to show up on time as if it's a job. If I don't perform my volunteering duties well, I get fired ("dismissed"). I'm expected to maintain my continuing education hours. I'm expected to dress a certain way (no perfume, no political statements, practical shoes since I'm cleaning). If I have more time to volunteer regularly, I'm expected to do it there rather than split my time between SANE and, for example, the animal rescue shelter. Think of it more as a second job, that you happen to not get paid for.

When you apply to volunteer, you'll go through an interview process. They will ask about prior trauma. They will not be doing this as a victim advocate, they'll be doing this as an antagonist. This is because you'll be in the "front lines" and if they can trigger you to have a trauma reaction, then you are not healed enough to be on the front lines yet. It wouldn't be safe for you or the victim.

In Summary My volunteer work has helped me turn my own trauma into something beneficial for others. It helps me to actively contribute to the betterment of women, rather than just talking about it online. It has given me nightmares and given me secondary trauma to work through. It has made me a better person.

I encourage everyone to volunteer somewhere. Not just off and on, but be one of the "on staff volunteers." Maybe it's SANE, but maybe it's for homeless women who need foot care. Maybe it's the domestic violence shelter, but maybe it's the pregnancy crisis center. Maybe it's not even trauma related at all, but helping women learn the local language or get job interviewing skills or providing babysitting while she gets therapy. I strongly believe we can and should turn our rage and trauma into good for society.

If anyone is interested, I also volunteer at the TPO (temporary protective order or "restraining order") office. I'd be happy to write up something similar if this proved helpful for anyone looking for the "volunteering vocation."