Stop Walking on Eggshells: Taking Your Life Back When Someone You Care About Has Borderline Personality Disorder (Paperback)

by Paul T. Mason (Author), Randi Kreger (Author) "Is someone you care about causing you a great deal of pain?..." (more)
Key Phrases: borderline personality disorder, pressure cooker, distortion campaigns, Stop Walking, The Inner World of the Borderline, Understanding Your Situation (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
Stop Walking on Eggshells: Coping When Someone You Care About Has Borderline Personality Disorder is a self-help guide that helps the family members and friends of individuals with borderline personality disorder (BPD) understand this self-destructive disorder and learn what they can do to cope with it and take care of themselves. It is designed to help them understand how the disorder affects their loved ones and recognize what they can do to get off the emotional roller coasters and take care of themselves.

From the Publisher
This revised and updated edition of the best-selling Stop Walking on Eggshells helps the friends and family members of people with borderline personality disorder (BPD) understand the condition, help their loved ones find effective treatment, and stop feeling as though they are walking on eggshells to avoid confrontations with BPD sufferers. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: New Harbinger Publications; 1st edition (July 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 157224108X
• ISBN-13: 978-1572241084
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (173 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #546 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

659 of 689 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A SINGULAR, INDISPENSABLE, LIFE-SAVING CONTRIBUTION ON BPD, August 24, 1998

By A Customer

I don't know how Randi Kreger and Paul Mason did it, but they have made a singular contribution to the world with their web site and with the publication of this life-saving book. Please allow me to post this from the book for anyone looking for help in or out of a bad situation right now:

Predictable Stages: People who love someone with BPD seem to go through similar stages. The longer the relationship has lasted, the longer each stage seems to take. Although these are listed in the general order in which people go through them, most people move back and forth among different stages.

Confusion Stage. This generally occurs before a diagnosis of BPD is known. Non-BPs struggle to understand why borderlines sometimes behave in ways that seem to make no sense. They look for solutions that seem elusive, blame themselves, or resign themselves to living in chaos. Even after learning about BPD, it can take non-BPs weeks or months to really comprehend on an intellectual level how the BP is personally affected by this complex disorder. It can take even longer to absorb the information on an emotional level.

Outer-Directed Stage. In this stage, non-borderlines turn their attention toward the person with the disorder, urging them to seek professional help, attemping to get them to change, and trying their best not to trigger problematic behavior. People at this stage usually learn all they can about BPD in an effort to understand and empathize with the person they care about. It can take nopn-BPs a long time to acknowledge feelings of anger and grief--especially when the BP is a parent or child. Anger is an extremely common reaction, even though most non-BPs understand on an intellectual level that BPD is not the borderline's fault. Yet because anger seems to be an inappropriate response to a situation that may be beyond the borderline's control, non-BPs often suppress their anger and instead experience depression, hopelessness, and guilt. The chief tasks for non-BPs in this stage include acknowledging and dealing with their own emotions, letting BPs take responsibility for their own actions, and giving up the fantasy that the BP will behave as the non-BP would like them to.

Inner-Directed Stage. Eventually, non-BPs look inward and conduct an honest apparaisal of themselves. It takes two people to have a relationship, and the goal for non-BPs in this stage is to better understand their role in making the relationship what it now is. The objective here is not self-recrimination, but insight and self-discovery.

Decision-Making Stage. Armed with knowledge and insight, non-BPs struggle to make decisions about the relationship. This stage can often take months or years. Non-BPs in this stage need to clearly understand their own values, beliefs, expectations, and assumptions. For example, one man with a physically violent borderline wife came from a conservative family that strongly disapprove of divorce. His friends counseled him to separate from her, but he felt unable to do so because of his concern about how his family would react. You may find that your beliefs and values have served you well throughout your life. Or you may find that you inherited them from your family without determining whether or not they truly reflect who you are. Either way, it is important to be guided by your OWN values--not someone else's.

Resolution Phase. In this final stage, non-BPs implement their decisions and live with them. Depending upon the type of relationship, some non-BPs may, over time, change their minds many times and try different alternatives.

And:

....When it comes to chosen relationships, we found that the BP's willingness to admit they had a problem and seek help was by far the determining factor as to whether the couple stayed together or not....

If you are looking at this right now, know that you are not alone. There are countless others who understand all you have been through for nothing. Get on the non-BP mailing list at Randi Kreger's site and buy this book NOW. It can and will save your life, whatever you decide.

291 of 304 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A brilliant analysis of a tragic disorder, August 12, 2001

By	Kate McMurry (United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Paul T. Mason, M.S., C.P.C., is a program manager of Child/Adolescent Services at St. Luke's Hospital and a psychotherapist in private practice at Psychiatric Services in Racine, Wisconsin. His research on borderline personality disorder ("BPD") has appeared in the Journal of Clinical Psychology, and he teaches seminars for mental health professionals on the effects of BPD on partners and family members.

Randi Kreger is a professional writer and an executive in public relations and marketing. She has collected more than 1,000 stories detailing the devastating experiences of people in close relationship with persons suffering from BPD ("BP's"). Kreger moderates two e-mail discussion groups for friends and family of BP's on her comprehensive Web site about BPD: [....]

Mason and Kreger's carefully written, highly readable book provides a brilliant analysis of a disorder that wreaks enormous havoc. In addition to clarifying what BPD is, they provide crucial survival techniques for those who wish to stay in relationship with the BP's they love.

There are extensive references and a list of recommended resources in this 258-page book as well as appendices on the following subjects: coping suggestions for clinicians, tips for BP's who have other BP's in their lives, a summary of causes and treatment of BPD. The topics covered in the main body of the book include: (1) understanding BPD behavior; (2) keeping control of your life while in close association with a BP; (3) resolving special issues, including raising a BP child, distortion campaigns of the BP against you, making decisions about continuing your relationship with the adult BP in your life.

The authors state that the central irony of BPD is that "people who suffer from it desperately want closeness and intimacy, but the things they do to get it often drive people away from them." Their needs are extremely difficult to meet, because they are so turbulent and irrational.

In a profoundly important departure from the militant-environmentalism stance that has engulfed the mental-health establishment for decades, the authors freely admit the existence of children with BPD. In the Freudian tradition, most psychiatrists continue to believe that BPD is caused entirely by poor mothering, with the damage only showing up in adulthood after the destructive childhood has ended. The real truth is, however, that BPD can occur very early in life, and in the most nurturing of families, both of which indicate there is a strong genetic component to this disorder. This vital insight on childhood BPD will bring great comfort to besieged mothers of BP children who are unfairly shamed and stigmatized by mental-health and educational personnel as the "cause" of their child's condition.

I believe this book should be required reading for every psychological and psychiatric training program in the country. It will also bring enormous insight, comfort and encouragement to the friends and families of BP's everywhere.

152 of 157 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Stop Walking on Eggshells: Taking Your Life Back When..., September 7, 2000

By	Barbara Davis-Thompson (NY, NY USA) - See all my reviews

This book brings humane understanding to the often perjorative term Borderline Personality Disorder and brings the reader to deeper understanding of those who suffer from this disorder, letting the sufferers of this illness be known as persons with damaged internal vulnerability that often can't be articulated, just acted out or in by the individual. What sets this book far above many books on BPD is the research the authors did utilizing the non-local reaches of the internet to quiz a number of persons in BPD self-help groups and also the self-help group(s) of persons who love and cope with those who have BPD. The comprehensiveness of this book is wide, indeed, in scope and what is profoundly interesting are the specific insights BP persons and those who love and care for them give which take you deep into the personal experience, agonies and challenges of coping with behaviors of this often misunderstood mental illness. The book also includes techniques for those who must deal with the rages and unpredictability of the PB person. One key piece of advice is to stop being a sponge for the feeling states that those with BP project onto those nearest them. Easily understood directions are listed on how to mirror the BP, hold to limits in a respectful, yet firm way, and to support the BP getting the help they need for the book strongly addresses the concept that ultimately those with BPD are responsible for their behavior. The authors give the reader interesting and useable scripts, provocative personal comments that make the reader deeply reflect on the agony of the BP's mental states and clearly details step-by-step what to do if you are the spouse, child or parent of a loved one with BPD. Wonderful resources are also listed to obtain help or more knowledge about this mental disease of BPD that many feel is untreatable, abelief which the authors of this book definitely do not agree with. An excellent and informative read and a must-have for a clinician's library.