ABSTRACT
This chapter starts with a true case and asks you to take a starring role. It discusses the artistry of patients in their disease portrayals and why it is easy to fool even doctors. Through detailed case narratives the reader observes patients going about their everyday lives as elaborate disease forgers. Underlying factors that contribute to factitious disorder and its relationship to borderline personality disorder are also discussed. Thankfully, human nature is mostly generous and a compelling story of suffering often brings out the best in us. But people with factitious disorder—briefly described in the Preface along with Munchausen syndrome, malingering, and Munchausen by proxy—practice a kind of thievery. Everyone who knew Rhonda agreed that she was a woman of amazing spirit. What they didn't know was that she was a master story-teller—a woman who was remarkably and skillfully deceptive. Rhonda had earned the admiration of her fellow nursing students and instructors with stories of her valiant struggles.
