View Cart (your cart is on dalkeithpress.com)

Edition: e-Book in PDF Format Price:   $20.00 online.  Ship for as little as $2 in the US Availability Emailed automatically - usually within 10 minutes Publisher Dalkeith Press ISBN 1-933369-0-7

Your purchase is secure, private, and guaranteed.  Paperback , Hardcover, Audio, and Quick-pack Editions

Contents

Back Cover

Look inside for more on  Detaching Look inside for more on  Healing Damage Look inside for more on  Overcoming Love Look inside for more on  Feeling like you have to stay

Discount Pricing: for Professionals and Charities

Back to Hardcover    Want to hear the author read selected sections? Order the Audio Highlights

Reviewer: J. Paul Shirley, MSW - Co-Author: Stop Walking on Eggshells Workbook

I highly recommend Richard's book, Tears and Healing. His writing is clear, and although his words are written with gentleness, he pulls absolutely no punches about dealing with the hard facts about BPD and its effects on everyone. Some people say there is a reason for the pain we go through having a partner with BPD, and in Richard's case I agree. He has a gift for lending a helping hand for others trying to walk that painful path. I don't generally get excited about new books on BPD, but Richard's left me feeling good & that's a rare gift for a writer to have.

Reviewer: Sam Vaknin - Author: Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited

There are bookshelves upon bookshelves of professional, scholarly, and utterly inaccessible literature about abusive relationships. Those who need it the most - the traumatized victims - are locked out by the jargon and the lack of practical advice. Recently, survivors and victims have taken matters into their own hands and have published their own books, replete with first hand experiences and tips. Tears and Healing is a fine specimen of such writing: sensitive, attuned to the emotional and pragmatic needs of the survivors, both deep and accessible, a helpful guide to the traumatic aftermath of abuse.

Reviewer: Randi Kreger - Coauthor: Stop Walking on Eggshells and the Stop Walking on Eggshells Workbook; Owner: http://BPDCentral.com .

In Tears and Healing, Richard21CP takes us along on his personal journey from his “lightbulb experience” to making painful decisions about his marriage to a woman with borderline personality disorder. It takes courage for non-BP partners to understand and take responsibility for their own role in the “borderline dance,” and even more courage to write about it. Richard has done both.

Reviewer: Darla Boughton, Manager of Narcissistic Personality Disorder/Psychopath forums  (4000+ members)

Tears and Healing is a must read for anyone involved in a devastating relationship with a personality disordered partner. It is a must-have, top-notch, first-aid kit to understanding the emotional devastation such a relationship causes. The author reveals his first-hand experience and knowledge. Let Richard's words reveal how to reclaim your sanity in an insane interaction with a disordered partner.

Author's Description 
Tears and Healing, The journey to the light after an abusive relationship is a self-help guide that helps people in relationships with an abusive partner to understand their situation, take greater self-care, and break free of the abuse. A reflection of the author's own trail from confusion to freedom, it outlines step-by-step the issues to be faced and teaches healthier ways to approach the situation. The steps include: contacting reality; understanding the abusers disease; dealing with love; finding yourself; dealing with obligation; healing from abusive treatment; and choosing how to move on with life.

Reviewer: Pamela, American Artist of Fine Art

I just started reading Richard's book, Tears and Healing. It is excellent. Over the years I have been in and out of the mental health offices of many professionals. I kept wanting to know how to get beyond the hurt, the heart over-ruling my head...how to say enough is enough. As I started reading the pages of this book...for the first time I felt a weight being lifted off of me. Those mental health people hadn't lived with someone with a personality disorder. They couldn't identify with me. So...here's to you Richard. Your book is excellent and I recommend it to anyone who wants to get off this merry-go-round and to start healing their wounds.

Reviewer: Lynn from Massachusetts

I wanted to let you know how much I have appreciated your book, Tears and Healing. It is written with such insight, reflection, and courage. Once I started reading it, I couldn't put it down- I just received it Thursday afternoon, and was finished with it by Friday morning. My close friend has been trying to "tough it out" with his BPD (borderline personality disorder) wife until the kids are grown. Your book has shed so much light on her condition, the way he has been treated, and the way he has been coping. It also shows that there can be light at the end of the tunnel, if he lets himself listen to his Soul's messages to him.

After reading your book, and seeing that you were able to start a new life away from the stress and abuse of your marriage, my heart feels lighter. My spirit knows what kind of positive intention to hold for my friend- that he listen to his Soul's messages. Again, thank you for the candor, wisdom, and openness of your beautiful and empowering book. I know that many lives have been and are going to be touched, healed, and inspired because of it.

Reviewer: Cobalt 

I originally hesitated to buy your book, because I thought it was geared to those ready to leave their borderline (personality disorder) partner. I think I feared being influenced to leave when I wasn't ready, a sure sign of my shaky boundaries. But I bought it, read it and feel I have benefited tremendously. A wet noodle, such as I, needed to hear it laid out plain: you're being abused and this is what happens to your psyche while you're being abused!. As a result of reading your book, other boundaries books, and my support group, that little washed out me is starting to stand up. I am working toward becoming the person I want to be in OR out of this relationship. There has been no miracle here, just a firmer awareness that I can teach him how I want to be treated. If he can't accept the stronger me, then so be it. At least I will know I have done everything I could to stay healthy while staying with my borderline husband. Thank you for writing your book, Richard. It is empathic and inspiring.

Reviewer: Kathy 

Richard, I received your book on Friday. I began reading and finished it Saturday. It was absolutely wonderful! My husband and I are both dedicated Christians. I have been abused for over 23 years of the marriage but I was "committed" and "obligated" due to religious reasons as you addressed. Finally, I heard on a Christian radio station that if sex between a couple was not mutual then it wasn't right. I thought I had been the "submissive" dutiful Christian wife, but I had not had anyone to talk to and so did not know. I began seeing a therapist who was great and validated my feelings. She was a Christian, too.  I found out that my husband had a personality disorder. After gallons of tears over the years - like you, I tear up over simple things, music, the National Anthem, tender things - I finally became strong enough to see an attorney. I filed for divorce in May of this year. I am now seeing another therapist (a Christian, too) who is supportive as well.

Abuse is when someone else hurts us to serve their own needs and uses the situation to lock us in and maintain control. Abuse can be physical, emotional, verbal or sexual. My own experience was being verbally and emotionally abused. I consider my experience to be particularly brutal because my abuser sought not just control, but to emotionally destroy me. 

But no matter the type or intensity of experience, I believe anyone currently in or having escaped from an abusive situation can benefit from my approaches. I worked hard to understand why I felt trapped and how I could escape. I read and studied many books on psychology and relationships. I pieced together the best ideas from these and added insight and models of my own. I've shared my experience and approaches as a mentor in online support communities since 2000. Hundreds of people in these groups have shared with me how unique and helpful my insights are. And thousands more have read and benefited from my online writings. 

Getting yourself out of an abusive situation and healing the damage it has done are not small tasks. It takes time and energy. But you also need guidance in what to work on, because abusive partners deliberately distort our reality to serve their sick needs. This book, combined with continued dialog in support communities, can provide that critical compass to navigate the dark passages until the light breaks through. 

I wish you good luck and Godspeed. 
Richard, 21CP - Famous 21st Century Philosopher

Are you lost in a relationship and don’t know what is true/false, right/wrong?
Look inside for more in Chapter 2 on Getting Back in Touch with what is Right/Wrong. 

Are you sure your spouse is nuts, but can’t make any sense of what he does?
Look inside for more in Chapter 3 on How your partner's illness spins you into it's orbit. 

Are you longing to just be yourself, but you don’t even know who you are?
Look inside for more in Chapter 4 on Detaching from your Partner Finding Yourself. 

Are you in love with someone who’s bad for you?
Look inside for more in Chapter 5 on Overcoming Love for an Abusive Partner.

Are you stuck in a sick relationship because you think you have to stay?
Look inside for more in Chapter 6 on Feeling that You Have to Stay.

Are you hurting from months or years of being verbally abused?
Look inside for more in Chapter 7 on how to Heal the Damage from Abuse.    

Do you know you need to change but just can't do it?
Look inside for more in Chapter 8 on how to Overcoming Fear and Making Changes.    

Are you wondering how I know all this?
Look inside for more in Chapters 1 & 9 on My Troubled Relationship and What Happened to Me, and then what came after.

Do you dream of a loving, sharing relationship? Do you want to get unstuck from where you are and find someone who can really love you?
You need what Tears and Healing can give you.     

What's Between the Chapter Headings?

Al-Anon:  Al-Anon can be a great resource, but sometimes its hard to figure out just what the heck Al-Anon is trying to teach you. Al-Anon almost seems to center around the concept of detaching, but just exactly what is detaching? Al-Anon mostly seems to teach how others have chosen to stay with their troubled spouses, but how do you detach and still have a marriage? 
Look inside for more on  Al-Anon and Detaching

Love:  Love is like the great whip-saw for many of us. We know our partner doesn't give us the love and caring that we want. Often we realize that the person we are living with now is not the same person we fell in love with. But our feelings of love are powerful, no matter how bad it may be, we still feel like we love and need our partner. Why? What is the difference between love and bring in-love? Why did you choose him? Why do you long for her after all she's done to you? How can you find balance?
Look inside for more on  Loving Someone Bad for You

Resources:   I offer some introduction to the resources that helped me most; including The Road Less Traveled by M Scott Peck; Stop Walking on Eggshells by Mason and Kreger; Al-Anon books; my whole recovery library; and web links that have helped me.

© 2004-6 Richard, 21CP and Dalkeith Press                       dwt