Susan Merrill

Sometimes, moms just have this nagging sense that something is not ringing true, but they can’t act on it because they don’t know what it is.

Three of my children were/are prone to lying.  One child lied out of pride.  If she did something wrong she would be so ashamed she would rather lie than admit it.  Her lying was fairly easy to address.  When she was little, if she lied to cover up something we would sit down with her and tell her we knew she was lying.  If she told us the truth there would either be no consequence or a simple one that fit the offense.  If she didn’t tell the truth, she would get a spanking.  Since she was little it was easy to identify her lies, and since she did not like spankings it was effective.  She learned that it was better to humble herself and admit wrongdoing than to feed her pride and cover it up with lies.

My other two children who lied were adopted from a situation where lying was a survival skill.  Lying at an older age is much more complicated because the kids are smarter, the opportunities are greater and the stakes are higher.  Spanking was no longer an option so highly prized privileges had to be taken away for a time, sometimes a long time.

The hardest part with older kids is just figuring out the truth.   I remember being so distraught about that nagging feeling once that I couldn’t even pray about it.  I was mentally exhausted and literally laid down on the couch wanting only to escape in sleep.  I don’t remember how long I laid there but an idea came to me that I use to this day.

I knew for certain one minor lie this child had recently told.  I told her that I knew she had lied to me and she was to go to her room and make a list of all the ways she had lied in the last month to present to me that night.   In the meantime, I prayed that the lie I actually knew about would not make the list until all the lies I didn’t know about did.  That night she presented her list and the known lie was not on it.   I told her she would spend tomorrow in her room and she could present her list again the next night.  Boy was she mad.  This went on for three days and the list got longer!  Finally, the “big lie” I suspected made the list along with the “little lie” I actually knew about.

The reality is lying makes people crazy because they can’t trust you.  A lack of trust is very bad for relationships.  If your kids lie to you they will lie to others in their future.  Lying can hurt your child’s relationship with their teachers, employers and, most importantly, their spouse.