Movies and books with BPD characters in

It can be anything from fiction, to non-fiction.

Please remember to write whether it's a book, movie, or both. Also please only post one's that you've read or watched.

To name a few of the obvious...

• Girl, Interrupted (book & movie. True story)

• Gia (movie, and a book written by another person about Gia's life, it's like a newspaper column book. True story)

• Prozac Nation (book & movie. True story)

• Fatal attraction (movie)

Book: An Unquiet Mind by:Kay Redfield Jamison

Girl in Need of a Tourniquet by Merri Lisa Johnson
Book (memoir). Haven't read it but read the info on Amazon and it looks good. If anyone else has read it, I'd be curious what you thought.

Also...let me ask it here and get an opinion. I've thought of trying to write a young-teen book about BPD. Girl, hard family life, moves to another town, no friends, first person who befriends her leaves, tries to commit suicide, committed, discovers she has BPD..something of that nature. Of course it would have to be fairly tame if it's meant for that age group. There's books about a lot of other disorders; why not? Someone has to shed light on the problem and the stigma. Don't worry, it probably won't be me. The wonderful trait of not sticking to goals is one of my major issues. Have started six books so far....

Good Will Hunting??? Could be kinda bpd-ish

Please only recommend/leave a comment with what you have personally read or watched.

Sorry...read the summary on-line. She was institutionalized at 28 never knowing she had it. It sounds really good...

Loud in the House of Myself, by Stacy Pershall. Really liked it, well-written, and the author made her story really easy to relate to. She consistently points out "this same thing is happening to a million other girls right now, in this same situation", making it her story, but not so much a book about just her, if that makes any sense.

Thanks for mentioning Prozac Nation! Even though Elizabeth Wurtzel was diagnosed with atypical depression, I always thought she had a lot of BPD traits. To me, it's definitely a book/movie about BPD, not just depression.

And, it may be only me here, but does anyone else feel like they could portray BPD a little more realistically in movies? Don't get me wrong, I like Girl, Interrupted, but it just seemed like the BPD traits were really muted, or that they sort of wrote it off as her being young, rather than really displaying BPD behaviour (I saw it in the theatre after I'd received my first diagnosis and was searching for something to relate to - I related far more to Lisa than to Susannah - was it just me?). Since it was the movie that kind of made more people aware of BPD; I always thought they could have done a better job. I enjoyed the book, though, it was put together in a very interesting way.

I don't know where all of that came from, I must be feeling chatty today

I've read it and it is very good

Actually, Susanna had a lot of BPD traits. She had attachment issues and took on other people's personalities and was easily influenced, to try and fit in. She had problems with dissociation, self harm, overdosing, pessimistic attitude, promiscuous, I could go on xD

I felt that in the book things were really well explained, I just wanted more from the movie makers - like, why she thinks she has no bones in her hand and why she bangs her wrists (both explained well in the book, but only got a brief and chaotic ER scene in the film). Even the nurse called her a "lazy, self-indulgent little girl" who was making herself crazy, which represented more of that "borderlines are manipulative" thing that's pretty unfair. It's easier to see the traits when you're familiar with BPD, but there are a lot of people who aren't, and since it was one of the only movies (that I've seen) that flat out said "this character has BPD", kind of putting it on the map for the general public, maybe they could have done more to explain/display it. I don't know though, she was more "acting-in" than "-out", and I am much more of an "-out", so maybe I just had trouble relating to her. I also take a lot of issue with the social stigma of BPD, so my dissatisfaction could come from that, too. We should all just make a movie ourselves.

Oh, and the movie Betty Blue should maybe go on the list? A lot of people say it's about a BPD character. I've seen it (years ago), but I kind of only remember the really intense ending.

This one sounds kinda crazy, but I've read in several BPD books that Anakin Skywalker in Episodes 2 and 3 is a perfect BPD character. He is volatile, assumes other people's identities (the Emperor), has major abandonment issues, shows idealization and devaluation, and is very impulsive when he gets emotional.