“Essentially alone with his misery, Cheever began hoarding pills in the drawer of his bedside table, until one day he blurted out that he was “frightened” while lunching with Don Ettlinger: “I wake up at night and I’m calling out ‘Daddy, Daddy, help me,’ and I’ve never called anybody Daddy in my whole life.” He also told Ettlinger about the pills, which helped; afterward the thought of suicide began to seem “less important,” and he decided to see a psychiatrist.”

(Source: 19841979, via popserial)