When do you say something about lying?

[Lilypad34]

Hello ladies!

My DSD has begun to tell porkies, such as..Oh the cat was scratching at my door all night. (She's with us all night in her bed!) So and so said this, that the other. No I didn't spill that, break that. Yes I washed my face. Other stories which you know she's fibbing about because she starts to mumble.

It's kids stuff I get it and for the most part I ignore it unless something is broken or spilt. DH ignores it too but I wonder does this stop or will it progress and how do we tackle the tall stories? It's not like it's a once a week fib she tells them every time she opens her mouth.

[SidneyBristow]

Mine does this too; it's a daily thing, and demoralizing. She says she can't help it, which is worrying in itself. I'm interested to see the advice you get, because I need some help over here too!

[NotaDisneyMum]

DSS was/is the same - I hate it, but we came up with a way of dealing with it that hasn't stopped him lying, but has stopped him lying as much to us

When he says something that is clearly not true, we pretend to accept it at face value, but then ensure that follow it through to it's natural conclusion, with all the consequences that comes along with it.

I remember one conversation, DSS was about 8, in which he claimed that he had, in the past, "nearly broken his leg" by falling down the stairs. DP said "Oh! I don't remember that", to which DSS said that it had happened after DP had moved out. He went on to say that he had spent the night in hospital and that the Dr's had said that he "wasn't allowed" to walk far ever again because of it. We realised that this was an attempt to avoid having to walk the dogs with us in the rain, as he had earlier that day, and which he had made clear that he didn't enjoy by moaning and whining the whole way.
Rather than tell DSS that we didn't believe him, we went along with it, we said how awful for him, asked if he had any scars etc, and DP even apologised for "making" DSS walk so far earlier in the day. He told DSS that he would get in touch with the Dr's and DSS Mum, and find out exactly what DSS was and was not allowed to do, so that we didn't make DSS break the Dr's rules again. DSS then looked thoughtful and said that it "might have been a dream" - which we agreed it might have been, as we were sure that DP would know if DSS had been in hospital overnight!

We've done this with a lot of different "lies" that DSS tells - along with the very, very clear house-rules that lying will always have bigger consequences than any other transgression. DP has followed through as well - DSS often lied about washing his hands, brushing his teeth etc; he now realises that it's a lot less hassle to just get on with it than deal with the consequences if he's caught out lying about it

In DSS case, he is unlikely to ever change because lying works at his mums house (he gets away with it) and he sees his Mum and grandma lie to get what they want, so it's not discouraged. All we can do is reduce it's effectiveness in our own home, so that he is less likely to do it.

[SoupDragon]

I think a lot depends how old she is - at 3 it's fine (they've just worked out that you don't know everything that goes on) but at 13 it's clearly not.

[K8eee]

Glad I read this post now. DSS is telling little white lies and funnily enough he seems to do it when his dad (DH) is around. I had him for the afternoon yesterday and early evening. He was an absolute pleasure to be around, and did as he was told with no playing up. When DH came home from work, the fibs started. Ok all children do it and its good for them to learn from it, but I'm wandering whether he is doing it as his mother lies a lot anyone else had the same thing happen? Looks like you have too Notadisney

[Xalla]

We have this with my DSD too. She really sticks to her guns though. A few weeks ago one of the kids drew all over the leather in my car. We knew it was DSD - the others are too young to write much other than their names and it was obviously her handwriting. We called the kids in and asked them who had done it. DS immediately said DSD. DSD denied it, denied it, denied it. We put them in separate rooms and said they had to sit there until they admitted it. An hour went by and she still didn't at which point my DH marched her outside to clean the car then straight to her room for a lecture about lying. It's done no good whatsoever.
The only thing that has I think ever made her thing about it is that we don't give her the benefit of the doubt anymore. If one of the other kids says she's done something and she denies, we'll say we don't believe you because you've been telling so many fibs recently. That seems to be the only thing that makes her shame-faced.
She lies about everything. She'll claim her teacher's given her express permission to take a certain toy into school for the day but it's invariably untrue. She'll claim she's been invited over to someone's house and try and get me to call the mother to organize it. She'll claim her shoes are hurting to get new ones. She'll tell me gymnastics is cancelled because she doesn't want to go. Recently she's turned the waterworks on at school claiming to be in pain but has been more than fine as soon as we turn up to collect her. It's a nightmare because her Mum often believes her so she gets away with it there but I always check and she resents me for that.

[Lilypad34]

So I've decided that unless DSD lies to me personally I am going to keep out of it. If DH wants to believe all she says that's up to him. I intend to ignore the lies and disengage.

[K8eee]

Got to admit kind of got the same head on too. I'm trying to brush it off and not react. Do like the idea of explaining the consequences. Put this into practice for the week we had DSS, and his reply was 'I'm only joking' when will they learn...

[flurp]

NADM that is a brilliant way to cope with it.
DSD used to invent illnesses to get her own way - every meal time bought on a tummy ache (but miraculously vanished for sweets!) if she didn't want to do something it was headache, sore foot, toothache etc... the list was endless. I wish I'd read your thread back then!!
Thankfully she is a lot better now but I will be keeping this up my sleeve for the next porkie she rolls out!!!!

[NotaDisneyMum]

Oh, the illness one was standard for DSS until DP actually began to treat him as if he was ill After DSS had missed out on a few ice cream treats and board game evenings he soon stopped the lies about headaches, tummy aches and the like.

[theredhen]

Ah yes the illness lies. Dss had the welfare officer round because of constant time off school.

If either of his parents had actually refused to let him near the tv or computer to help him "recover" from his illness, perhaps he wouldn't have skived off been ill so often.

My ds knows that being being ill doesn't equal fun.

[Morien]

DSD (8) lies too - sometimes it's harmless enough, 'suchabody said such' when it's clearly untrue, and in that case we ignore it. Then there's the dogged denial of things we know she's done, which we do call her on, but only once we can show her how we know for certain (it doesn't tend to take long!) Faced with the proof she's usually quite shame-faced, whereas without it she sticks to her lies. What's worse, although I leave this to DP, is the bigger lies - DP had a note from one of DSD's teachers recently, asking him to get in touch. It turns out that DSD had told the teacher that she hadn't done her homework because DP had told her it wasn't important and she didn't need to do it... DP had serious words with DSD over that - but she claimed it was the teacher's fault, that she'd never said that and the teacher had made it up.

[Lilypad34]

Best one so far, dh collects dsd from school and is congratulated, dsd is expecting a sibling how wonderful..he takes dsd to school the next day and the day after that when he picks her up from ex house, she says so I hear x is expecting...

Dh says, no I wondered if it were you but wasn't my place to ask if you hadn't already told me. They both then find out that at school dsd had told everyone she was having a baby brother or sister. She isn't!!!!

[brdgrl]

My teenage DSD does weird ones. She will tell us about a dream she's had - while it seems to start off as truth, she just can't help elaborating on it and is clearly making much of it up as she goes. She'll also repeat jokes or observations she has heard elsewhere, pretending she's just come up with them (sounds harmless, I know, but it does wind me up, especially when she gets a laugh or praise for her cleverness, which of course just makes her lie more). Sometimes it is just massive embroidering of an event from the past, even things she knows we were there for. DH prefers to just ignore it, in his opinion it is just harmless and while he is somewhat concerned about the ease and frequency with which she tells these sort of lies, mostly he just feels a little embarrassed for her. I am not sure - I think we should just be calling her on it, mildly and frankly, every time.

Both SCs (and probably every other kid ever) do the lies/exaggerations about illness and injury. DSS does it purely to get out of school or other things he doesn't want to do, whereas I think DSD is more motivated by wanting sympathy. My strategy is always to take it at face value...make sure they don't eat anything that might disagree with them (so, plain toast and tea, no treats), lots of rest for brain and eyes (no screens) and that they don't risk a relapse by going out too soon after. This works, of course. Problem is that DH is much more inclined to pamper them whenever they claim illness, and then to turn around and let them go out with friends the next day. He admits that he's not doing the right thing, but can't seem to stop it.

[likesnowflakesinanocean]

i pull them up for lying about things. i hate lying. thats ds and sc though. dp too i try my upmost not to lie and expect them to do the same, plus with these 3 it seems if you dont get caught it doesnt matter