My son is lying. What should I do?

In My Humble Opinion
1

We’ve caught a couple of lies in the last few days, and I’d really like to nip this in the bud. Paul is ten, and we have a pretty good relationship. I don’t scream at him or beat him when he does something wrong, so I can’t see why he’d feel the need to lie.

The first one happened a couple of days ago. He was in his room with the door shut. As I approached the room, I heard a sudden violent rustling of paper, and opened the door to find him just standing in the middle of the floor. When I asked him what he was doing, he said “nothing”, but when I told him I’d heard the noises, he sheepishly retrieved a crumpled page of math problems from behind the nightstand. He explained, “I was just doing some math for fun.”

I gave him a quizzical look as I handed the paper back to him (noticing as I did so that the problems were numbered). I didn’t say anything, but went away for a few moments. When I came back, again I heard the sudden stashing of the paper. I put my head in and said cheerfully, “Ready to quit lying and do your homework?” He came along without further ado, and we spent the next hour and a half wrestling with his long division, including re-doing the ones he had already gotten wrong.

When we finished, I calmly explained to him that he had upset me with his lying and that he shouldn’t be afraid to tell me the truth, and he apologized with apparent sincerity.

However, the next day my husband met Paul coming in from the garage, carrying a plaque. It was some piece of sports memorabilia that had belonged to my ex-husband (Paul’s father). Paul’s dad had a collection of sports junk, mostly Nascar matchbox cars. These things were kept in a trunk, and when we divorced, Paul’s dad said Paul could have this stuff. The trunk is stored in the garage, with some unwieldy things piled on top of it, so it was kind of surprising that the kid had gotten anything out of it without help.

When my husband asked, Paul told him that his dad had asked to have this thing back (true) and that I knew all about it (not true).

When I picked Paul up later that same day to go visit his dad, I noticed the plaque and asked about it. Paul told me that my husband knew he was getting it, and in fact had helped him move the stuff in the garage. Today when my husband and I compared notes, we realized that Paul was lying again.

I plan to talk to the boy again when I get home from work today, but I don’t know what I’m going to say that I haven’t said already. Should I punish him, and if so, how? Maybe wait for the next lie?

2

Well, my children are under two years old, so this is coming from someone with no experience with ten-year-olds. But I would (gently) confront him about this second lie, explain why it’s important that he tell you the truth, and warn him that next time you catch him lying to either one of you, he’ll be grounded (and no TV, computer, video games – maybe for a day). Then if he does it again, make sure you follow through. You don’t have to be angry with him, just firm. You could even explain that it hurts your feelings when he lies to you; he might respond to that.

3

Well, I second the telling him that it hurts you when he lies and punishing him if he does it again, but understand that no matter what you do you won’t stop him from lying. He will just get better at it. In the next few years he will start doing things you have taught him are wrong, he will struggle to find out who he is and what he wants out of life, he will rebel for the sake of rebellion. He will lie to you about these things. Try to impart upon him how important it is that he tell you the truth (“If you say you are going to Johnny’s house and you go to Lisa’s house instead that could cause serious problems. What would happen if there were an emergency and I needed to find you?” etc) and make sure he knows that though he may be in trouble for something he does his punishment will double if he lies to you about it.

I would also teach him over the next few years how to make smart, logical decisions even in the worst situations on his own so if he does decide to lie to you about something you can know you gave him the tools to handle the situation on his own. (You shouldn’t drink. Drinking is wrong. Being drunk is bad, but being dead is worse. If you do decide to drink put your keys away and plan on staying where you are for the night. Do not drive and do not get in the car with someone else who has been drinking.) Granted, 10 is a little young for these conversations, but start small and work your way up.

4

You might want to talk to him about why he would lie and say he wasn’t working on his homework. Maybe the way you’re working with him on his homework isn’t doing too well for him.

5

I’m not a parent but…

Doesn’t seem like your kid has a lying problem so much as a problem with math and a problem with your divorce. He’s just 10 and doesn’t know how to deal with either problem.

I’d peg a kid a liar if he broke something and denied it, or ate a bunch of cookies before dinner and lied about it. Being weird about homework and about stuff regarding his dad seems like a completely different topic.

6

He does struggle with math. A lot of times he’ll just try to guess at the answer without even working the problem. We often spend the whole afternoon on his homework, but I have the patience of a saint, I swear! I can’t figure out why anyone wouldn’t enjoy doing long division with me. :wink:

As for having problems with the divorce, well, I admit it was an ugly one. But I would be delighted to let Paul take that trunkful of stuff back to his dad. I’d have thought he’d know that.

I think I’ll have another heart-to-heart talk with the boy today, and then let him know that there will be Dire Consequences if there is any more lying after this.

7

Maybe he thought that it’t hurt you to tell you that his dad asked for the stuff back? He might have been stung by it, and figured you would be too? I’d not focus as much on the lying (and punishment for it) as to the “why” in these two cases. Explain to him, that even though the truth might sting, you’d still rather have it than a lie, because a lie would sting even more, and have longer term effects. I say this because of the kind of lies he has told. As for the math, can you find a tutor that might be able to help him gain some confidence with math?

8

I’m not a parent, but speaking as a former child, I lied when I was afraid of getting into trouble for whatever it was that I was lying about. If the penalty for lying is in excess of the penalty for telling the truth – and if he doesn’t think he has to be afraid of your reaction if he tells the truth – the lying will become less of a problem.

9

I agree that I would be more interested in these cases about “why is he lying” than the fact that he is lying. It seems like he is lying because he doesn’t know how to deal with difficult situations, not because he did something wrong and is trying to get out of it. I think his feelings about the divorce may be complicated and although you may assume he would know how you feel about things, he may be worried you would react somehow to his giving something back to his dad and he may be trying to protect him.

I wouldn’t focus on the lying like I would in other situations. I would have a talk with him like you said and focus on telling him you are open to hearing what he is worried about and you are wondering why he seems to feel like he can’t tell you the truth. I don’t think he is lying out of spite or to challenge you, which would warrant punishment, I think that once he is reassured that he can tell you what is happening, the lying will stop.

10

Don’t have any brilliant advise to offer, but can sympathize with you. We had a period during which my youngest would occasionally lie. Drove us crazy, probably most of all because we didn’t understand why she would tell obvious falsehoods about what seemed to us rather minor and random things. I think we tried every variation from ignoring it to punishment, none of which clearly worked.

Ultimately, the only response I decided upon was to openly tell her every time we suspected a particular falsehood, tell her how important trust and honesty was, and how damaging the lack of same was to relations with family and friends. I hope it doesn’t get to the point where, instead of an isolated couple of lies or omissions, you find you basically distrust your kid in general.

All I can say is I can presently speak of it in the past tense because she is currently 15 and as far as I can tell pretty darned honest and open with us now. So I don’t know if it is a stage she “outgrew.” If so, I’m glad she went through it when she was 10 or 12, instead of when I when she’s older and has more serious things she could be hiding and lying about.

11

The whole crumpled up paper thing is making no sense to me at all. He was doing homework alone? And hiding that?

Sounds to me like he was looking at porn and had to stash the magazine really fast when he heard you coming.

12

No, actually that’s a rather common ten-year-old homework dodge ploy. He was probably playing with the paper, (more entertaining than solving the problems) heard his mom coming, decided in a split second he wanted to dodge the homework, so hid it.

13

Obviously, he knows you’re a softie and he can get away with it. Some screaming and beating is in order.

Okay, not really. But I agree with this:

14

Based on the problems he’d done on his own, I’d say he was just trying to estimate the answers. It saves him a lot of time.

If I do find porn in his room, I promise I’ll be posting about that too! :eek:

Thanks for all the answers. There’s a lot of food for thought here.

15

What’s wrong with parents today? You can’t handle a lying 10 year old child? Beat his ass. Next time you catch him in a lie, make him go into the front yard, break a switch off the tree, and spank him with it. Let’s see how many lies you catch him in after that! I truly fear this new “time out” generation. In my day, time out was a luxury. Spare the rod, and you spoil the child.

This sort of reminds me of one episode of that television show, “The Boondocks”. Some bad child was running a muck in the grocery store, screaming and knocking down products because his mother wouldnt buy him candy. Old Grandpa comforts the crying mother, who just doesn’t know how to handle her child. Then he calmly asks, “Have you tried, beating the child?” He then hands her his belt… Problem solved. :smiley:

Here is a clip:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3741533380418828298&q=the+boondocks&hl=en

16

I have some experience with children lying, from a first-hand perspective. Looking back I can say I definitely had a problem with lying that only began to be resolved when I was in my teens. I think the root cause was social awkwardness and anxiety.

I was a pretty shy kid and very unsure of myself. If someone confronted me about something that made me feel even remotely self-conscious I would lie to them. I’d make up crazy stories that didn’t even make sense to me to deflect the question. Sometimes I’d take things from people and have no idea why I did it, therefore when confronted I had no choice (in my mind) but to lie. When a teacher asks “Why did you steal Lauren’s pen?” and you have NO clue why you took her pen, lying is the easy option.

Not that I’m saying your child is as weird as I was, but look closely for any social issues or personality issues that might be contributing to an avoidance of the truth. I WISH someone had realized I was struggling with social anxiety disorder before I was 17. It would have helped so many things.

17

My sixteen year old, a lovely person her whole life, went through a period (at around age 10) where she told me a few lies. I think I handled it well, but maybe this wouldn’t work with your kid, I don’t know. I just frowned, looked pretty befuddled, as if I were trying to figure out how this could be so, shrugged “I guess it’s that way, darling. I thought otherwise, but I guess you’re right.” The next lie, I was even more perplexed: “Really? Huh. I was positive it wasn’t. You sure? Okay, I’l take your word for it…”

The combination of extreme shock with resolution by trusting her finally proved too much for her to handle, and she stopped the lying after a week or so. Maybe I couldn’t have pulled it off if these lies were about things that really mattered, but this tack worked fine for me. She felt (I think) that I knew she was lying but because of the trust I placed in her to be honest, I couldn’t accept that obvious explanation, and I think she dreaded the point where it would dawn on me that she wasn’t to be trusted anymore.

18

I’m trying to think back on my childhood, if I went through a lying phase, and I don’t think I really did. I still don’t lie much - I can’t be bothered to think something up, and then try to remember what I said to whom. Maybe that’s how you can approach him; tell him that lying and covering it up is a lot of work, and maybe he’d be better off just sticking to the truth. Oh, I’d do this every time you caught him in one, too - let him know each time that you know he’s lying, and you’re not impressed.

19

I hope I’ve just been whooshed. Please tell me you’re joking.

I mean it…I can’t tell if you’re serious or not.

20

Well, for little white lies I wouldn’t hit a kid, but when I was little I got a spanking if I lied to my parents about important stuff (homework, etc.). It was never a beating, just a slightly painful swat to the rear end, once. I cried more because I knew that my parents were mad at me - the spank didn’t actually hurt much. “Beat his ass” is definitely not cool, but giving a kid a quick swat on the behind for lying about homework? I don’t think so, not if the lying continues.

Then again, it depends on the kid - another method might be effective. But for me, that got my attention, and I’m a pretty honest person nowadays.

~Tasha