Borderline Personality Disorder

So I was reading an article in this week's LA Times, and my intuition alert started going off big-time. Bingo! Bingo! Bingo!

"What?" I asked myself, a bit annoyed. "This doesn't apply to me or anyone."

Still, I couldn't shake that nagging sense that this might mean something I should pay attention to. I do have a bit of an interest in mental illnesses and their effects on people's lives and interpersonal relationships.

Who knows? Maybe this is research I'll need for a story some day. Or maybe it's something helpful to you, and that's why I was moved to post it here, where I can always find it again.

*******

Borderline personality disorder often can be difficult to distinguish from bipolar disorder, depression and anxiety.

But the essential feature of BPD is a pattern of unstable personal relationships, self-image and emotions and impulsivity.

Traits (at least five of which must be present for a diagnosis) include:

* Efforts to avoid abandonment * Unstable, intense interpersonal relationships * Identity disturbance * Impulsivity * Suicidality * Mood instability * Chronic emptiness * Inappropriate, intense anger * Paranoid ideation or dissociation -- Shari Roan

Source: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, American Psychiatric Assn.

Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times

For help in coping with BPD, check this article and resources through NAMI.

Speaking of Cups...

"We are cups, constantly and quietly being filled.

The trick is, knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out."

– Ray Bradbury

Vacation

You know you're really into this writing stuff when you're off on a fabulous three day break in San Diego and you're thinking how you can't wait to set your laptop up next to the pool...

and it could not be more gorgeous here.

Sun, a breeze wafting through the palms, water splashing and kids laughing while I look over the boats in the marina and string my words together...

The Universe Suggests

If you're still alive

My regrets are few

If my life is mine

What shouldn't I do?

I get wherever I'm going

I get whatever I need

While my blood's still flowing

And my heart still beats...

Beating like a hammer

Beating like a hammer

This One Is Mine

This One is Mine by Maria Semple is, simply put, the most engaging novel I have ever read. The prose sparkles; the plot surges forward from page one.

With its compelling depiction of class intersections and the compromises people make to achieve their own comfort, This One is Mine is part romance, part cautionary tale, and part tribute to the sunny, unique world of Los Angeles and its supporting canyons.

The characters are so fully drawn and compelling that I was halfway through the book before I realized that a main character shares a name with an extremely unpleasant colleague of mine. The character is such a completely separate person that I didn’t even make any real-life connections. The world of the book IS real life while you’re reading.

Violet, the main character, struggles to find her new identity after leaving her TV writing job for the less-defined challenges of being an at-home mother and supportive wife. Her husband balances the increasing strain of his music executive career against the fraying of his marriage. His sister, Sally, deals with not one, but two, life-threatening illnesses while searching for her Mr. Right and the social status she presumes he’ll bring with him. The other characters interact with them in fascinating trajectories along their own lives.

In a book that is completely readable and a gripping page turner, Semple deals with some surprisingly grim subjects: diabetes, infidelity, poverty, drug addiction, social climbing, Asperger’s syndrome and abortion. Yet, despite their many flaws, or perhaps because of them, the characters are likable, believable, and, most of all, forgivable.

This is a book that must be experienced. Believe me, purchasing This One is Mine and immersing yourself into Semple’s amazing story will be the best thing you’ve done this year.

Today's Quote - Richard Bach

A professional writer is an amateur who didn't quit.

-Richard Bach

Writer's Digest - September 2009

Today I'm working in the cafe of my local Barnes & Noble. After sufficient amounts of diligent application, I stopped for a snack. From the news rack behind my table, Writer's Digest caught my eye.

I'm glad I decided to flip through this month's issue, and I highly recommend that you do too.

Featured are articles about how to write a query letter, the details of contracts, and descriptions and contact info for 24 agents who are actively seeking new authors. That's gold right there, baby.

And if you don't have an agent yet, yes, you probably should.

At least grab the magazine, and send out a few queries. What do you have to lose? Think of them as the slightly alien, vaguely aggressive salespeople who protect the purity of your art by dealing with the commerce aspects of publishing. If you ever hope to make money or a living from your writing that is.

If you don't care, then by all means, continue to devote yourself only to your self-determined message and your own Musings.

There's also a set of very useful articles about writing Memoir. My own is a few years down the road, I think, but it won't hurt to set the magazine aside and refer to it then.

I was in a friend's Memoir manuscript once, and the result shocked me. It was like being erased. The character who showed up in my place was so completely unlike me that I wasn't sure whether my friend was trying to be protective, trying to be insulting, or, the most depressing possibility, simply had never really known me as a person at all.

So I can't complain too much if I don't agree with the portrayal. At least no one will ever recognize me!!

And I'd have to say that this month's WD is a resounding success. If their goal is to write content so compelling that a reader wants to keep reading, well, they hooked me from the headlines. One more copy sold - tough economy be damned. I'll be taking my September friend home.

And reflecting on which of the agents has the most warm and friendly-sounding name.