During a childhood bout of polio, Sheed learned to his relief that few diseases are as bad as they look from the outside and, to his amazement, that he was actually happier fighting polio than he had ever been before. Later, as a successful, high-living author, he fell prey to what is loosely called depression, an emotional hell ride brought on by booze and sleeping pills, which sent him on a frantic round of psychiatric sessions, AA meetings, and not least a sanitarium, where it was suggested that he'd contracted yet another incurable disease called "addictive personality." And there, while still strung out on chemicals, Sheed the critic began to question the reigning dogmas of therapy and to rediscover his own resources for dealing with sickness.