The Angry Heart: Overcoming Borderline and Addictive Disorders

"As a qualified counsellor working in the addiction field, I think this book is an excellent resource. It is also very straightforward and positive in terms of achieving a healing outcome. It is the book I would give anyone who was in denial about whether or not they might have borderline traits or the full blown diagnosis of BPD to help them understand themselves better and why they feel as they do. Like all personality disorders BPD is on a continuum - a majority of addicts will display borderline traits for example! The book clearly explains the connection between childhood early abuse and neglect and the development of the following borderline issues - stress and emotional hypersensitivity, instability, over control, rage, abandonment fears, poor impulse control (ie addictive drives), lack of trust issues, feelings of emptiness, self punishing (because one was made to feel bad as a child so continues this by hurting oneself in various ways as an adult - ie addiction). There are reflective exercises to do at the end of each chapter to deepen awareness. Interspersed with the story of Simon which give a useful backdrop to the ideas covered. One criticism it completely omits the clarifying ideas of dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT) and Masha Linehans work which are a real cognitive insight into the behaviour patterns which manifest with this disorder. Check out her books on Amazon too! Highly recommended "
~ Written on 2007-11-09

"I wrote in August 2000: "I find this book very bad... The book gives weak answers to hard questions that deserves better"

A qote from the book: "This book was designed to help those who are are burdened by borderline and addictive problems to overcome the psychological causes of these problems"....."Readers afflicted with these problems may be actively blocking their feelings and will view this book's stories and commentary as irelevant to their lives"

It's never to late to open up and reflect on your own life and see your probblems straight in the eyes and this book has turned from "very bad" and irelevant to very helpful to me.

I own you that."
~ Written on 2005-02-26

"not yet finished this book..only on chapter 5. but at this point i wwould like to write that this book is very powerful/good. i have never yet been moved to review an amazon purchase or suchlike on the web. i think i am a borderline and things are often very bad.
i have approached this book from a very hopeless place, but i think i am ready and this book was a real find for me.
not sure if this review will help anyone else because i have considered myself almost as helpless as a 'free' human being can be, but well i hope so. (see, 'hope' already).
it is only a book but if you are a sufferer and you are ready then read and understand and it could help you.
the exercises are a bit too serious/structured for me at the moment, but they could be useful."
~ Written on 2004-09-19

"Personality disorders are a relatively new diagnostic area. The ICD-10(the equivalent of the DSM-IV) doesn't even recognize some of them asseparate disorders (e.g., the Narcissistic Personality Disorder). Othersare controversial even in the USA (Borderline, Antisocial, Schizotypal).Textbooks are, therefore, of limited use to both practitioners andsufferers.
Sorely needed are self-help books that guide the perplexed through aregimen of exercises and coping strategies, an interactive framework whichrests on current knowledge, and an organizing principle to tie it alltogether. This book offers all three abundantly. It is bound to be of helpto therapists, self-help groups, victims of the disorder, and theirnearest and dearest."
~ Written on 2004-04-21

"As someone who works professionally, as a psychotherapist, with clients suffering from borderline and addictive disorders I have found "The Angry Heart" an extremely useful resource. It has helped me in refining techniques to practically help my clients and enable them to start putting their lives back together. As a psychotherapist trained in EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing: see www.emdr.com) and open to different approaches, I was already using some of the book's practical suggestions with my clients, encouraging them to keep a journal, challenging negative thinking with affirmations, etc, but this book has moved my thinking on in very helpful ways. I have only just got hold of it, so it is not 'road tested' yet, but I have already recommended it to one client and will be sharing it with another when I start work again after the Xmas break.

What makes this book accessible and therefore especially useful is that it is solidly based in real clinical work. The book is effectively co written with one of Joseph Santoro's clients, his story is interwoven in with the theoretical and practical aspects of the book. This makes for a poignant and powerful core to the book.

A section I particularly liked was one in which Santoro gives advice on how to interview a prospective therapist. If only more people would ask these questions before entering into a relationship with immense power to heal, but also, with an unsympathetic or rigid therapist, with the dangerous potential to get you even more lost.

I'd recommend this book for any therapist for its wisdom and practical suggestions. "The Angry Heart" is described as an “interactive self-help guide” for overcoming borderline and addictive disorders, but I think it would be useful for anyone unhappy with their life as it is and seeking change, as it sets out very clearly how our past can affect us and then offers practical tools for ensuring we can break free and become the selves we have always had it within us to become. Anyone suffering from depression would also I would think find it very valuable. I buy a lot of psychology books, skim through them and leave them on the shelf. This one is different.

Good companion books would be John Lee's "Facing the Fire" and by the same author, "Growing Yourself Back Up"

Michael Green B.ED (Hons) Cantab, APMSAP, MACP, BCP Reg
London
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~ Written on 2003-12-28