For more than 35 years, the Ben Gordon Center has been a respite for DeKalb residents looking to cure the ailments of the gloomy, wintertime blues.

Originally established during the ’60s, the Ben Gordon Center, 12 Health Services Drive, was created to provide DeKalb with mental health specialists comprised of an executive director, a couple of secretaries and a few specialists.

With current president and CEO Michael Flora, Ben Gordon has flourished to a staff of 90 employees offering a vast array of services including two subset branches in Sandwich and inside the Reality House.

Flora highlighted the period of time from the fall equinox to the spring equinox as a time when a majority of Americans suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder. This mental illness arises from the shorter days typically clouded over with extreme cold. The timing, especially the post-Christmas days, can lend a big hand in keeping morale down.

“There’s a post holiday let down as well as getting back into the routine [New Year’s] by setting new goals and objectives,” Flora said. “It’s the psycho-social stresses of things not realistic we put on ourselves.”

Flora said these stresses include the desires to lose weight, drink less and find ways to strengthen relationships.

The brain’s decrease of melatonin and serotonin chemicals in the brain is what makes it susceptible to a depressive state. Flora said Ben Gordon has seen a significant increase in people looking for some sort of care.

In January alone, Ben Gordon saw an increase of 18 percent in services and since the last fiscal year they have seen an overall increase of 20 percent.

Flora assured people looking for help that Ben Gordon operates on a continuum of care that goes through a multiple-step process, eventually leading to a course of treatment with a professional therapist typically lasting anywhere from six to eight weeks. He said recovery rates are at about 90 percent.

Flora said they also accommodate people of all financial levels by depending upon a person’s income level and insurance. He said Medicaid and Medicare are also accepted, but that most importantly for anyone in dire need of help, there’s no barrier for treatment.

“It’s great to know that you can receive help and you can receive treatment and that the treatment works,” Flora said.

Ben Gordon also has a 24-hour, seven day a week toll-free crisis hotline (866) BGC-0111 that’s monitored at all times by a licensed professional for people who are in need of emergency services.

“We can have them come in [to the Kishwaukee Hospital] or we can go out to them — especially if someone is suicidal – so we can help them face to face,” Flora said.

Flora added that one of the best-kept secrets of Ben Gordon is just how vast their clinical treatments are. He cited specifics in terms of care for women, attention deficit disorder in children and a full compliment of care for alcohol abuse.

Flora, who has been with Ben Gordon for under a year, said he’s been impressed with its staff, and urges people struggling with anything in their lives to seek help that will work.

“I see it in their faces every day,” Flora said. “They care for our patients and we want to help the community. By seeing such positive clinical outcomes, it is extremely rewarding.”