This chapter sets the scene for the rest of the book. Across time and across cultures, functional somatic symptoms have presented under many different guises, been given many different names, and been conceptualized in many different ways. Theories and speculation have therefore abounded, but without any firm scientific foundation. It is only very recently that scientists have come to learn enough about the body-and about the stress system, in particular-that a scientifically grounded understanding of functional somatic symptoms and their treatment is beginning to take shape. After a few brief paragraphs about such background matters, this chapter turns to the three authors themselves and how each of them came to be involved in the issues addressed in this book. The hope is that readers will see parts of themselves in these stories and also, in the process, come to consider how they each came to be involved in this intriguing and challenging field.