Best Books on Borderline Personality Disorder

Borderline personality disorder, marked by symptoms of impulsive behaviors, mood swings, and difficulty in social settings, can be a difficult and challenging diagnosis to navigate. Your therapist may have some book recommendations for you, but if you’re looking for more books on borderline personality disorder, this list can help.

Books for Those Diagnosed With BPD

A BPD diagnosis can be scary, but it doesn’t have to be. These books are here to help you through the most challenging parts of BPD, including how to move beyond common setbacks, establish healthy routines, and more.

1. The Way She Feels: My Life on the Borderline in Pictures & Pieces

If you’re looking to know that you’re not alone with your BPD, you’ll appreciate Courtney Cook’s illustrated memoir on her life. She was diagnosed with BPD and how it’s changed her life: the therapy, the hospitalizations, treatments, and more. But it’s also about the joy she found in the little things, like her favorite color or how much she loves mini corn dogs. BPD can be intimidating, but maybe Cook’s book will help it feel a little more human.

2. I Hate You–Don’t Leave Me

This is considered a must-read in BPD, and for good reason. Now in its third edition, it remains a comprehensive look at what borderline personality is, the way trauma impacts it, and current treatments.

3. This is Not the End: Conversations on Borderline Personality Disorder

This Is Not the End is a unique collection of interviews and first-hand stories from people who have struggled with borderline personality disorder (BPD). It also includes insight from their loved ones – partners, friends, family members, etc., as well as mental health professionals. Edited by mental health advocate Tabetha Martin, This Is Not the End is honest, inspiring, and at times, difficult to read. It doesn’t shy away from the painful realities of a BPD diagnosis. In addition to real-life stories and personal essays, this book includes an overview of diagnosis and treatment methods.

4. Girl in Need of a Tourniquet: Memoir of a Borderline Personality

Girl in Need of a Tourniquet is a compelling memoir from author Merri Lisa Johnson. This is a great book for those diagnosed with BPD, offering Johnson’s first-hand account of how this disorder impacted her health, relationships, and life in general. Ultimately, it is a testament to seeking professional help and choosing to pursue healing. At times heartbreaking, Girl In Need of a Tourniquet brings readers along for Johnson’s harrowing journey to her breaking point, past the edge, and back to a healthier, happier state of mind.

5. Get Me Out of Here: My Recovery from Borderline Personality Disorder

Get Me Out of Here is a candid depiction of how BPD actually feels on the inside – overwhelming, explosive, frantic, and desperate. As a memoir, it reveals how intensive therapy and support were the key ingredients for mother, wife, and writer, Rachel Reiland, to start healing from BPD and overcome anger, substance abuse, and anorexia. Reiland has crafted a candid depiction for readers that starts with her diagnosis at age 29, follows her journey as a self-proclaimed “tough chick” and “loner,” and ends with this hopeful message: You can get better, too.

6. Borderline Personality Disorder – A BPD Survival Guide: For Understanding, Coping, and Healing

BPD can feel like being stuck in a never-ending cycle of intense emotions and impulsive, destructive behavior. For anyone who has reached the end of their rope, this book by Anna Nierling wants you to know that you’re not alone. Borderline Personality Disorder, a survival guide for understanding BPD, will help you find peace and stability, repair broken relationships, and escape the cycle of desperation and pain. It offers an empathetic overview of the causes, symptoms, and treatment options for BPD – providing a detailed map of your first steps toward a brighter, happier future.

7. Sometimes I Act Crazy: Living with Borderline Personality Disorder

BPD can be an intimidating diagnosis: you have frighteningly intense mood swings or struggle with your loved ones. This compassionate and thorough guide, written by psychiatrist Jerold J. Kreisman, offers a piece of hope and guidance for those with BPD. In this book, you’ll learn how to manage mood swings, develop healthy relationships, and better understand yourself.

8. The Borderline Personality Disorder Workbook: An Integrative Program to Understand and Manage Your BPD

This therapist-recommended workbook may have already been recommended to you: it is a staple in BPD self-help. If your BPD diagnosis terrifies you (and everything you’ve read online only makes it worse), this workbook offers real, concrete advice on navigating your BPD. Using evidence-based dialectical behavior therapy, acceptance and commitment therapy, and more, this workbook meets you where you are and works with you to create a stable, healthy life.

9. Mindfulness for Borderline Personality Disorder: Relieve Your Suffering Using the Core Skill of Dialectical Behavior Therapy

Mindfulness has been proven to be beneficial for many different mental health conditions, and borderline personality disorder is no exception. This workbook outlines several ways mindfulness can help you work through your BPD, leaning on DBT techniques to soothe overwhelmed emotions, address relationship problems, and more.

10. Coping with BPD: DBT and CBT Skills to Soothe the Symptoms of Boderline Personality Disorder

Those who are tired of struggling with their intense emotions thanks to their BPD diagnosis will appreciate this compassionate guidebook. It outlines how to soothe common issues those with BPD face and establish healthy routines when emotions go haywire. It also addresses substance abuse, negative self-talk, and other common side effects of living with BPD.

Books for Loved Ones of Those With BPD

Whether it’s a mother, family member, or significant other that has BPD, here are a few books to help you work through some of the common issues you may face. Recommending these books can be a great way to help someone with BPD.

11. Loving Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder: How to Keep Out-of-Control Emotions from Destroying Your Relationship

Those with BPD get a bad reputation: they’re portrayed as violent, manipulative, and in some cases, uncaring. Author Dr. Shari Y. Manning knows that’s not the cause. Those suffering from BPD can be immensely kind and considerate, but can struggle in personal relationships and push away those they love with destructive behaviors. Understanding your partner and how their BDP makes them act the way they do takes information and patience. Loving Someone With Borderline Personality Disorder offers a framework to help you work alongside your partner with BPD to create a caring, healthy relationship that meets both of your needs.

12. Stop Walking on Eggshells: Taking Your Life Back When Someone You Care About Has Borderline Personality Disorder

If you struggle with someone you love manipulating you or feeling overly controlled by a loved one, they may have BPD. If so, there are ways to find peace again in your home. This self-help book outlines how to set boundaries, establish your needs, defuse arguments, and more.

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13. Say What You Mean: A Mindful Approach to Nonviolent Communication

While not explicitly written for those with BPD, author Oren Jay Sofer is a mindfulness expert, and Say What You Mean offers a few solutions to common communication issues. He put together this book to help anyone who struggles with communicating in anger, whether in a BPD relationship or in general life.

This is a good read for anyone who wishes to communicate more compassionately and effectively, but it is especially useful for those dealing with BPD. Sofer outlines how to remain confident in conversations, understand the true intent of conversations, and navigate anxiety during difficult topics. 

14. The High-Conflict Couple: A Dialectical Behavior Therapy Guide to Finding Peace, Intimacy, and Validation

Highly-reactive couples – those quick to anger or argue – usually need more than the standard relationship advice available. For couples where one partner struggles with BPD, this can be all too common.

Still, you don’t have to write off the relationship as doomed. This workbook outlines the importance of understanding, and better controlling, your emotions so that the heart of the argument can be resolved in an effective and understanding manner. While good for any couple who struggles in fights, this book is especially impactful for those who deal with BPD. 

15. When a Loved One Has Borderline Personality Disorder: A Compassionate Guide to Building a Healthy and Supportive Relationship

When a Loved One Has Borderline Personality Disorder is a compassionate guide to building healthier, more supportive relationships based on tenets of balance, boundaries, and understanding. It uses clear strategies and simple exercises to help readers explore their loved one’s feelings and motivations while still acknowledging their own emotional and physical health. Discover effective tips, techniques, and writing prompts from author Daniel S. Lovel, PhD, and start building healthier relationships today.