A social worker taps his own experiences to counsel troubled teens

Growing up in Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood, Christopher Dominguez ’18, ’20 MSW faced the reality of gangs and violence.

His parents, both immigrants from the Mexican port city of Veracruz, had limited resources but wanted him to go to college, so they pushed Dominguez out of Chicago to attend high school in the suburbs — Morton West in Berwyn — while keeping him away from the drugs so prevalent around Little Village. They insisted that he never lose sight of the necessity of higher education.

“I shared an education goal with my parents from a very young age, in part because I always liked school,” said Dominguez. “It was always my aim to go on to college and graduate.”

Dominguez earned his bachelor’s degree in psychology and master’s degree in social work from Aurora University. He chose the social work field with the guidance and mentoring of AU professors who saw in him the potential to live out a dream he had since childhood: find a way to help the people in his neighborhood and others like them overcome the destructive influences of gangs, crime, and drug abuse.

Today, at 27, Dominguez said there is nowhere else he would rather be than working as a clinical therapist with troubled teenagers at Linden Oaks Behavioral Health in Hinsdale.

The mental health of adolescents has gained wide attention in recent years as drug addiction and suicide rates have risen among young people. Dominguez sees it all: teens dealing with anxiety and depression and obsessive-compulsive and self-harm behaviors as well as attention-deficit disorders. He counsels patients in group sessions and in individual therapy, and conducts sessions with entire families.

“With the increase in suicide and self-harm behaviors, there is much more awareness of mental health among young people than there was years ago,” Dominguez said. “Some of these kids are just out of the hospital. Many are on antidepressants. For some, their parents aren’t very involved in their lives, which creates conflicts that can lead to defeated feelings and helplessness. Many have been traumatized.”

As a 23-year-old master’s candidate at AU, Dominguez spent nearly a year interning at the Gateway Foundation in Aurora working with adult men detained for monthlong programs trying to shake their drug addictions. He conducted group therapy with as many as 18 individuals at a time.

“Some of our patients did fall through the cracks and didn’t get better,” he said. “Yet I loved the challenge. I was much younger than many of the guys I was caring for, but I convinced them that I was there to help them.”

Dominguez still lives in Little Village. He bought a house close to his parents.

“I grew up around the stigma that therapy was weak or negative, a thought I was always against,” said Dominguez. “It’s my pleasure to now provide a safe place of healing for the adolescents that I work with, to remind them that they are not alone in their time of need.”

This story is an excerpt from the spring/summer 2023 issue of AU Magazine. Click here to read the full story about six alumni finding purpose and passion.