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Teenagers

Help with lying 15 year old girl

4 replies

BonesyBones · 22/07/2014 15:01

Hi everyone, I'm hoping someone can offer a bit of advice.

Me and my partner provide kinship care for my 15 year old sister and I'm really at the end of my tether with her. All she ever does is lie. I have no idea how to deal with it. She's been living with us just over a year now and I honestly can't think of a single day that has passed where she hasn't lied about something.

Little things I can handle, things like going out with a different friend than who she says, or where she's going (I don't expect her to keep me up to date every 5 minutes and I know she's not going to wild parties because she only has 2 friends, one lives over the road and the other lives above me, so I usually know what's going on anyway).

It's the big ones that are really starting to get to me.

For example: in September last year she left her facebook account logged in, allowing me to see messages to several people from school about how she was pregnant, definitely keeping the baby, raising it with her boyfriend, and then a week later that she had miscarried. This really hit me hard as after trying to conceive for 3 years my partner and I had only that month suffered our sixth miscarriage. Obviously I know that I was never meant to see this, and that it was never intended to hurt me. When I asked her about it, she denied it all point blank, I showed her the messages, to which she replied "I don't remember saying that", and then the next day she changed her mind again, stating that she had told school mates she was pregnant while still living with her father in the hope that someone would flag it to teachers and she would be moved out of the house.

This made little sense to me as I myself was pregnant at 15, and was never moved, so she knows this would have been unlikely, as well as the fact that even the "I'm pregnant" messages were sent after she had moved in with us...

But I was tired of two days of arguing and just left it at that

I did mention it, several times, to her social worker, who said that it was normal teenage behaviour and basically told me just to get on with it because they had no room in care homes for her (not that I was suggesting that anyway).

Anyway between then and now there have been plenty of other things, from her behaviour and attendance at college, stealing from me and my own children... I could write a list for days...

This morning her Facebook was left signed in again, so I checked it (whether I should or not is a matter of opinion, but to be honest I'd rather know the truth about things than her version of events).

She has recently been to visit her mum who lives quite far away, and it became apparent from the messages exchanged that she has told her mum she has a job. She doesn't have a job. She has never had a job. To some extent though, I can understand that the relationship she has with her mum would make her want to seem like she is doing well for herself, I can just about understand the "I'm doing really well for myself I've even got a job.".

With this "job" came an imaginary boss, who sounds like an awful person! He won't even give my poor sister the day off for her birthday! She's overworked and treat like some kind of animal in this imaginary job, (which is probably for the best as she does nothing around the house). I can't really understand the whole making up an evil boss thing to be honest... but it gets worse than that...

The most recent message to her mum said "can you pleeeeeeease lend me £20 I'll pay you back next week I really need to get a long skirt and a shirt and some dolly shoes for work coz he says hes going to fire me coz im so unpresentable and [me] and [partner] havent got any money for like two weeeeks"
to which the reply was that mum had no money herself
and my sister then said:
"its okay my friend says she can lend me a shirt but can you just lend me a tenner for a skirt and shoes pleasee"
funnily enough mum was still skint.

Now I'm a bit confused as to why she needs this money so desperately. She gets pocket money, she always has everything she needs, strangely enough she has a shirt and a skirt and flat black shoes. I ask her every week if she needs anything (generally referring to deodorant, make-up, sanitary towels etc, but not limited to these things, she knows this as she has requested clothes/underwear/shoes as she feels she needs them.

Looking through her other messages, it's not only her mum she wants money from... She asked friend (upstairs) to borrow £30 because [me] and [partner] had no money, and also asked our other sister for money (no mention of why though).

Now we're far from financially well off, but we budget well and we're certainly not struggling or in a position where we'd have no money for two weeks, so all of the above is lies.

We know it's not drugs, we both have past experience dealing with drug users as well as living in a very deprived area, with drug use all around, we would spot the signs. Same for alcohol.

I just don't know what to do anymore!
My though this week is to buy her a shirt, skirt and shoes that she so desperately needs and replace her pocket money with them. May also resort to waking her up at 6am every day so she can pretend to get ready for her pretend bloody job!!

I just keeptelling myself it's only 21 days until she's officially old enough to move out, and I really don't want to think of her like that!

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to stop the lies?
Social work are not interested at all.
Grounding/Stopping Pocket Money/Changing Internet Password/Taking Phone Away are all things we've tried without any effect.

Also tried talking with her about things she may be upset about etc, she's had a referral to cahms but refuses to go, she is adamant she doesn't have any issues and doesn't need help.

How can we possibly help someone who won't help themselves?

I also have a 6 year old with ASD who is convinced that our two week old baby gets more respect than him, so I really don't need moody teenagers and house shaking arguments at the moment, I just need her to stop lying!

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titabeth · 22/07/2014 19:38

It probably doesn't seem like lies to her. Sounds like she lives in a fantasy world, like most 15 year old girls, and boys. People lie on Face book all the time. It is difficult if not impossible to stop someone from telling porkies. All you can really do is point out the consequences of being untruthful, and that it can cause problems for everyone. It also sounds like attention seeking behaviour, ie why leave your facebook account open if you don't want someone else to read it?

Most people who engage in attention seeking have a genuine need for some kind of attention, point out that this is making you give her the wrong kind of attention. I'm sure she rather be told how well she's doing by her big Sis.

She is probably very insecure, but as her sister rather than her mother it's not going to be easy to help her. Maybe you could help her get a real job. Also, there's no reason why she couldn't contribute to looking after the home buy doing washing up, etc. Tell her you love her, even if it's through gritted teeth. She probably needs you much more than she is able to say. I wouldn't recommend just buying her the skirt. Try and build up some trust, maybe take her on an outing just you and her. Hope this helps

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titchy · 23/07/2014 08:11

If she lies to you - big lies like telling you she's staying at a friends and she ends up at a random house party, then punish her for that. But if she lies, exaggerates etc on FB to other people let her reap the consequences, not sure why you're so worked up about that tbh.

Well done for taking her in though. I guess you and her are still feeling your way a bit.

And she won't be able to leave home at 16 by the way, please don't think that's your get out clause or threaten that. She needs security and certainty above all else for the next three years.

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BonesyBones · 23/07/2014 12:05

Thanks for your replies, I'm bothered about it because she has been repeatedly told that lying is something I won't tolerate, I'm not talking the odd little white lie, I'm talking on the bigger scale of it. I completely agree that if she's just exaggerating to her friends then it's up to her to deal with the consequences. However, by suggesting that I don't have the money to provide what she needs, to people who will happily contact her social worker to tell her this, and cause a big hoo-ha that I really don't have the time and energy for, she is causing a problem.

As for leaving home a 16, while she is in no way ready, she is determined that this is what she is doing, and she has the full support of her social worker.

Also on another note, she is actually doing well, she just did a year at college and come out with a gold award for her course, she's also about to start an apprenticeship as a social work admin assistant in a few weeks (which no, she does not need a uniform for!). She has plenty to be proud of, and I tell her at least once a week that she is doing well, that we love her and are proud of her and what she is achieving, she's the first of three of us (siblings) to do all of this straight from leaving school. I just don't understand why she feels the need to constantly make things up.

I suppose it doesn't help that the behaviour reminds me of our father, who I spent a good four years trying to escape from. I just want it to stop.

She's done it again yesterday evening, telling her future employer that she can't start on the day they asked her to because I need her to babysit. I don't need her to babysit. The truth is that she is going on a long weekend teambuilding thing that her social worker put her forward for. I don't know how daft she can be really. Social work already know where she's going to be, and that's who she's going to be working for.

I just don't understand.

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titchy · 23/07/2014 12:17

You dont' understand etc - she's 15! They make things up, they like the drama of things and they get sucked into the attention they get. I doubt it's malicious, just immature. And if people go reporting what she says to her social worker so what? The SW comes to you and says is it true and you say no of course not. I do think you are making far more of this than you should and that you both have much bigger things to deal with.

Really don't sweat it, unless it's to you personally and involves putting herself in a dangerous situation. She isn't your father and there's no reason why you shoudl think that.

And I tell my kids several times A DAY how much I love them and how proud I am of them, not once a week.

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