Through The Looking Glass: Women And Borderline Personality Disorder

by Dana Becker

To what extent is borderline personality disorder (BPD) a truly “female” affliction given how women are socialized? This and other questions are addressed within the context of the historical relationship between women and madness, as well as women’s often-strained relationship with the psychiatric profession.In a refreshing look at the facts behind why a preponderance of women are diagnosed with BPD, Dana Becker provides evidence that the struggles of these “borderline” women are extreme versions of the day-to-day struggles many women face. Examining the relationship between gender, psychological distress, and the classification of BPD as a psychiatric disorder, the author offers a new emphasis on elements of female socialization as keys to understanding the development of borderline symptoms.The book should appeal to psychotherapists in all professional groups—psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, and other mental health professionals—as well as graduate students in these disciplines. It should also be valuable to those involved in the fields of women’s studies, psychology of women, sociology, and the history of medicine.

Genres: Mental Health, Feminism, Nonfiction, Psychology, Psychiatry

224 pages, Paperback

First published June 19, 1997

Reviews

[danielle · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great book about the intersection of women's studies and psychology. It explores the ways that constructs of femininity historically and presently are more heavily pathologized than constructs of masculinity.

She does not posit that Borderline Personality disorder is merely a result of this tendency; instead she describes the clear problems that people with this and other personality disorder face on a daily basis.

She is interested in how gender plays a role in classification, treatment, and stigma of personality disorders. She argues for a more dimensional approach to classification of personality disorders rather than the ironically black and white categorical ones. I agree with most of what she states and find her ability to balance psychology and women's studies refreshing.

[xylatra · Rating 4 out of 5]

A weighty, weighty read at just 159 pages; this took me a good few days of hard concentration, re-reading a lot of confusing sentences, and looking up some words in the dictionary, to complete. This book is so laden with medical jargon that I couldn't even work out if her talent as a writer wasn't as good as it could be, or if it simply contained too many big, long, weird medical words for me. Either way, it was hard to read, and didn't feel aimed at your average BPD sufferer but moreover those with strong academic backgrounds who already have a decent grasp of all the strange grown-up words.

That said, I was on the edge of my seat with literal heart-pounding excitement; this book is frankly mindblowing. I'm considering reading it again to gain even more insight hopefully than the first read. The rarity of the knowledge and understanding given to female sufferers of BPD actually makes it all the more frustrating that this book is not easier to read. The insight contained in these pages is EUREEKA-like in it's revelation in psychiatric history and "professional" treatment of female madness: from the days women were branded as witches, to being diagnosed with female hysteria, to being diagnosed with BPD... whilst male soliders were being diagnosed with (the far less stigmatized... the taken-much-more-seriously...) PTSD rather than a "personality disorder" for essentially enduring trauma of just a different sort that so many women diagnosed BPD are.

This book finds flaw with the very disorder that brands so deeply "flawed" female victims of physical, sexual, and emotional abuse. An almighty breakthrough.

[Tanya Roe · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book years ago when I was first introduced to the diagnosis of borderline personality disorder. This book is more clinically focused than some others but I found it very helpful to read as I am a clinician myself.

[Linda Sliz · Rating 5 out of 5]

A history of psychiatric diagnoses of women with special attention to Borderline Personality Disorder and "borderline symptoms" and the extent to which socialization of women makes them prone to traits that are quite similar to "borderline symptoms." Reminds of a few people I know..and helps me understand them