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Understanding the Borderline Mother: Helping Her Children Transcend the Intense, Unpredictable, and Volatile Relationship By Christine Ann Lawson ( Jason Aronson )
Release Date: 2002-07-28
Average Customer Rating:
List Price: $40.00
Price: $32.40
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Product Description
Some readers may recognize their mothers as well as themselves in this book. They will also find specific suggestions for creating healthier relationships. Addressing the adult children of borderlines and the therapists who work with them, Dr. Lawson shows how to care for the waif without rescuing her, to attend to the hermit without feeding her fear, to love the queen without becoming her subject, and to live with the witch without becoming her victim.
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 Wonderful insight
For the first 30 pages, all I could think was, "Oh my god, that's my mother." Ms. Lawson describes perfectly both the BPD person and the devastating effect the behavior has on her family. It has taken me over 50 years to realize my mother has never been normal. This book has given me the understanding to realize that I'm not morally obligated to take my mother's abuse and the peace of mind to put some emotional distance between us. I highly recommended this book to anyone who is uncomfortable with the way a loved one interacts with them, and I'm grateful to the psychologist who overheard me venting about my mother and recommended this book to me.
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 good information ( greatestbooks11 )
On the one hand there is an attempt to draw similarities between fairytale characters and borderline mothers. But on the other hand this book reads like a textbook. There are references to studies, psychologists, data, etc. Having substantiated data is obviously not a bad thing, but it distracts from the reading. It felt as if the writer couldn't decide what type of style the book should be written in.
There is good information. I think one of the most important pieces of advice is that when the mother turns into a "witch," the adult child ought to escape. As soon as you feel her mood switching, drop everything and leave her presence. Do not subject yourself to her dark moods. Don't argue, don't discuss, don't reply.... just leave.
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relief! ( rlm4040 )
Finally, a book that provides understanding about the behavior of my grandmother, my mother, myself, my sisters, and even my 10-year old niece. This was an enlightening first step to understanding the crazy dynamics of my family. Highly recommended to the confused and frustrated.
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expensive, but worth it! ( stacydanyell )
i'm not sure why this paperback costs as much as it does, but...if you have a borderline mother, it is worth every cent. not many books i've found are written on the subject of BPD mothers specifically, so that makes this one all the more valuable.
i'm not sure if it actually helped me in a significant way, as far as dealing with my MOMster goes, but it was a great insight into the land of BPD mothers and their children. It was cathartic just to read experiences and behaviors and know i'm not the only one, i could have written half of it myself. i guess it was most useful because it allowed me to validate my feelings.
a lot of the "dealing with borderline" books spend more time on trying to explain to you why they are, or how to understand or have compassion for them. i'm not a calloused person, but i just didn't find that stuff useful for my situation. i wanted something that would allow me to be upset and "selfish" about my feelings. i'm not trying to fix her or find excuses for her behaviors to make everybody feel better about it, i'm trying to heal myself from the abuse she inflicted upon me, and prevent further damage, and this book is good for that.
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 Jungian inspired stereotyping at its worst
I was both horrified and fascinated by the degree of flippant, revengeful, misinformed
information given in this book that transforms Borderline Personality Disorder into a synonym for "bad" mothers. The author seems incapable and unaware of the nuances and enormous heterogeneity of this disorder. A disorder that runs the gamut of enmeshment with other disorders on "Axis I" (dysthymia, bipolar, etc.), and often with other traits from ALL other disorders on "Axis II". How dare one generalize? There are many many subtypes linked to the complex constellation that - for lack of a better name and due to a long history of ignorance - we call today "Borderline Personality Disorder" : i.e. painful emotional dysregulation under stress, very real neuro-cognitive deficiencies, horrendous difficulties in processing negative emotions and hypersensitivity to the feelings of others, coupled with a nervous system condemned to staying on red alert, - all which leads to often lethal feelings of shame and despair in great part fueled by scornful, critical, hateful and punitive attitudes that society and authors such as this one pile on people who have this dx.
Yes there are many subtypes of BPD but "witch" and "queen", etc. are not among them. Jung's archetypes are here converted into Lawson's stereotypes. I am bewildered at how many people seem to applaud such impoverished and infantile language.
Many parents have trouble parenting. They might even show many of the behaviors in described in this book. They are most certainly not all suffering from "Borderline Personality Disorder". And many parents - mothers and fathers- who are suffering from BPD are the first to be intensely concerned about trying to be good parents - but of course in a book like this they get no press at all.
Children blaming their parents for their problems is endemic to American culture at the moment. This book is just one more example. The voice of a child that feels that she has been abused runs throughout every line of this book. She is telling her story under the covet of "explaining" BPD. There is nothing objective here - just an ardent desire to give everyone else a chance to call their mother "borderline".
"Borderline Personality Disorder" has given Americans a way of reviving the witch hunt of old. A label so overused and much abused that it has unfortunately become more toxic than the disorder itself - and certainly much more so than the people who suffer from it.
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