Shining spotlight on a dark issue

 With each call that came in, I grew more depressed, more frustrated.

After writing a few weeks ago about my daughter's sexual assault on a college campus, other mothers who had gone through similar experiences wanted to connect with someone else who also had been through this unique kind of hell.

One mom tried valiantly to control her sobs as she told me about how her daughter, raped in her college dorm a few weeks earlier, was becoming increasingly despondent.

Another mother's daughter had attempted suicide.

A third mother's daughter had succeeded.

There were other calls, as well; other e-mails, including one from a mom whose daughter's assailant soon would be released from prison. Most of these women, however, expressed frustration because the monster had never answered for the crime that had virtually changed the lives of so many people.

In the case of the college rape mentioned in today's front-page story, the assailant lived on her dorm floor, so his victim had to see him each and every day.

My advice to her came from years of working with the amazing people at Mutual Ground, the local domestic violence and sexual assault organization.

Strongly encourage your daughter to go to police, even three weeks after the crime, so this jerk won't think his despicable actions were somehow OK.

"At some point, you have to suck it up and put some trust in the system," Mutual Ground Executive Director Linda Healy told me.

That's because — and here's the good news — the system in place to help sexual assault victims, whether they are tiny children being abused by a loved one, a student raped by a so-called friend or a middle-aged woman attacked by a stranger — works much better than it ever did.

Although it's far from perfect, there's no doubt that everyone, from hospitals and police to prosecutors and judges, "are a lot more sensitive" to victims and their needs," says Healy.

The real problem, unfortunately, lies with the rest of us.

As angry as she became after a federal judge in March ordered a young Naperville woman to watch a videotape of her rape (he later reversed that ruling), Healy was even more incensed after talking to a mother who found an e-mail her daughter had written to a friend, revealing she'd been raped over the weekend.

The friend's response: "You weren't raped. You had surprise sex."

"We are going into our schools and talking to 40,000 kids," says Healy, referring to Mutual Ground's prevention program in local classrooms. "Yet young people have become so desensitized" to inappropriate sexual activity, "they believe it's OK ... that you are going to be raped once or twice in your lifetime — and just to expect it."

Sexual assault is not something to glamorize, as is often the case with prime-time television these days. Nor is Sexual Assault Awareness Month something to celebrate.

But because shame, humiliation and ignorance keep it in the shadows, this issue needs to be spotlighted again and again and again ... spotlighted until EVERY victim realizes it is not her fault when someone forces himself upon her against her will.

Until EVERYONE understands it is against the law to have sex with anyone underage and/or without consent.

Until EVERYONE understands there is a viable system in place to help the victim, and loved ones, deal with the aftermath.

Until we all feel empowered enough to come out of the shadows and talk openly about this ugly issue.

Each one of these mothers who called me did so because they were hurting.

But one thing I have found through my experience: from pain comes strength.

And from strength comes progress.