This booked claimed to be about how to live with BPD, but it was just like their other book (but this did have updated info and new treatments and studies, etc.). It talked not to the borderline, but about them. This always makes me feel uncomfortable, like I'm some difficult 'other', not a real human being. I know it wasn't intentional, but c'mon, they should know how to speak to borderlines, they're experts in the field.

Has a lot of good things, and explains in detail how a borderline is. Also gives some treatement options at the end of chapters.

My therapist has diagnosed me with borderline tendencies. i do not completely fit the diagnostic critea for the borderline diagnosis. however, i do see these characteristics in me. never before has someone so completly exposed my inner thoughts and feelings. it was a relief in a way to understand there was a reason behind the way i acted or the things i said. this book was very informitave. my only fault with it is it didn't really tell me the person with borderline how to get better. it told my spouse how to deal with me in a way that actually would work, but my spouse in this case isn't the one reading the book. i am, and i want to get better. i want to have stratigies for me so that i can work on it on my own.

I'm trying to figure out how best to deal with a possible BPD sufferer with a minimum of grief for everyone. I have high hopes for this one since it's by the authors of what everyone hails as the BPD Bible (I Hate You, Don't Leave Me), which oddly enough, someone took out from my local library and never returned, along with several other BPD books. Color me shocked. ;)

Update:

Not as helpful as I'd hoped but somewhat insightful.

I wanted a more medically-oriented book when I picked this one up. But if you're looking for something with personal anecdotes, stories, etc. then this is probably the book for you.

This book was published in 2004 so I feel it’s very outdated now in 2020. I am diagnosed with BPD myself so I picked this up to learn more about myself. I found the science behind bpd very interesting, but I also found there’s a lot of negative stereotypes and misconceptions in this book which ultimately lowered my rating.
I understand that for each chapter/symptom it’s written as a worst case scenario but I wouldn’t like somebody to read this book and come away thinking that every borderline is like that, and conveys worse case scenarios of every symptom.
The media has always painted borderlines in such a negative light, and I felt that this book continued to do that even while educating on the science behind the illness. I found the way borderlines were described in part of the second to last chapter to be slightly offensive. We are not manipulative, guilt tripping or needy. We are not ‘unwanted borderline patients’.

TLDR; science was great, description of borderlines was not so great.