Facilitator Guest Star: Susan Komisar Hausman

It is an honor to be invited to post the first facilitator entry on this blog! Thank you, Ellen!


It is also an honor each time I represent Darkness To Light at a workshop or write about its mission or address a group about child sexual abuse (CSA). I always attach the prefix, “award-winning” to my descriptions of Stewards and point out with pride its National Crime Prevention Council distinction. I believed from the minute I found my way to the D2L web site over three years ago that this was a unique program, one that held great promise for children, and that belief has not wavered.. In fact, the more workshops I do, the more folks I reach, the more deeply I believe that adult education is the key to mitigating this epidemic. I have seen first-hand that D2L can inspire hope and healing and, most importantly, change. It’s an honor to be a part of D2L as a facilitator.


Wherever I go folks have questions for me: how did I find my way to Darkness To Light? What inspired me to become a facilitator? People want to know the hows and whys, especially folks who attend the workshops. Some folks have asked if I find the work depressing because the problem is so epidemic. Never, I tell them. The work is uplifting, even though the topic is heavy. Why? Because I feel I am making a difference.


I’ve told the story many times: that in exploring the internet one afternoon in spring of 2006, looking for resources on my own healing road, I came across a site that was unlike any other I had explored, a site that conveyed the message that it was an adult’s job to keep children safe from child sexual abuse. Prevention. No other site I had visited to that point led with the prevention message aimed specifically at adults. I was riveted to the pages. I read and re-read, absorbing the message like a sponge, alternately moved and energized. That site was Darkness To Light.


At the time becoming a facilitator necessitated a sponsor. Who would sponsor me, I wondered? A former accountant, I was not a social services professional, I had no agency to approach. Instead, a light bulb lit up in my head and I thought, “I wonder if our sisterhood would be interested?” The sisterhood of our synagogue, where my husband is rabbi, an organization I had limited involvement with, but which was comprised, I knew, of good, dedicated women, working in a variety of realms, many of them community-oriented.


I picked up the phone and made a call. In minutes I was told that the sisterhood board would be meeting that night (karma!!) and I should attend to share what I had found and what I was seeking. I did, and, in a unanimous vote, the sisterhood board agreed to be my sponsor. Our Boston-area D2L journey was born.


Several months later I attended a FAC workshop in Mount Kisco, NY. A beautiful October day, the autumn leaves made a striking picture against the bright blue, cloudless sky, prominently visible through the long windows of the hosting church. Except for a couple of phone conversations with the instructor, Tiffany, I knew no one, but from the moment I walked in I felt a camaraderie and peace that washed away any concerns I might have had. Here in this room were folks from a variety of backgrounds of a like mind, who got “it,” who understood how important this prevention mission was. It was powerful and meaningful, a great day.


And so, here I am, over three years later, many workshops under my belt, a 2nd Facilitator Workshop sponsored by our sisterhood coming up soon and the work continues. We have hosted two pre-dawn walks, literally walking from darkness into the light, drawing awareness to both the program and the problem. There have been frustrations, of course, there has been some resistance, of course, but the mission continues, one workshop at a time, one participant at a time, one foot in front of the other.


Most folks who attend my workshops are there out of choice, but it has never failed to be true that those who resist or are there out of duty to their job, display an emerging awareness and understanding by workshop’s end, often culminating in a true call to action. Those moments are awe-inspiring. There has not been one workshop that I’ve done where someone hasn’t told me of his/her own story of CSA or that of someone they love. Nor has there been one workshop where at least one attendee isn’t stunned by the statistics or learned something they didn’t know about grooming or a behavior they’d seen that could indicate an abused child in their midst, even if they’ve worked with children for years. This is a workshop that speaks volumes; and attendees hear. I know first-hand of policy changes in youth-serving organizations based directly on the awareness folks gleaned from Stewards. I also know of mandated reporters who better understood their obligations because they had taken the workshop.


I could go on, but time and space dictate otherwise. Instead, I’ll wind down where I began: I believe deeply in the tenets of Stewards Of Children and the commitment to a program of excellence by Darkness To Light. I believe this 7-step program and its four powerful tools for implementation have the power to inform those who might otherwise never have known how they can make a difference in the life of a child, the safety of their community, helping to resolve this sobering, pervasive problem. My hat is off to my Darkness To Light colleagues, and my fellow facilitators, for working so hard to press on with the message: we can make the world safer for our kids.

  Susan Komisar Hausman - Stoughton, MA
  kissesfromdolce@gmail.com
  (781) 264-0181