At wits end - Need some advice - 8 Year Old Boy

jmcc99_98

I hope someone might be able to help me by offering some advice.
My wife and I have two boys, 8 and 3.
The 8 year old is going through a period (About a year) where he is constantly lying - I could watch him throw a stone and say to him, did you throw that stone and he will deny it, I will say I saw him etc etc , he just keeps denying it over and over again. Eventually he will admit it but not until there is a huge drama.
Generally he is not bold as such but will take zero responsibility for anything - EVERYTHING is blamed on the three year old.
He will be punished for misbehaving, e.g. sent to his room, TV taken away for a while, friends not allowed visit etc, this usually causes major drama. When the punishment ends he will be acting as if nothing ever happened and is likely to turn around and repeat the exact same behaviour again.As I type I know it may sound trivial but it really is beginning to wear us down - it is a constant battle with him to tell the truth.I gets lots of positive attention from my wife and I and very often is taken away on his own for treats, without his little brother etc. So he is getting attention.I am happy to bring his to see a specialist about his behaviour, but at the same time I am afraid it might legitimise his behaviour, i.e. he is highly intelligent and can be quite manipulative. I can see him then misbehaving and blaming it on there being "something wrong with him" and "its not his fault" This is made all the more worrying due to the fact that my wife is pregnant and due in 4 months and she does not need the stress either.Is this lying normal? If not who should I speak to? Where does one go? i.e. a psychologist, a psychiatrist, a counsellor ???

Xidu

Haha, almost every child tell lies. I often lie to my mom when i was a child. my 3.5 year old daughter blame everything on her 1.5 year old. They know what they did is wrong n will make parents unhappy, that's why they tell white lies. They think if they lie then problem will be solved.

What I did to my daughter is, give big kiss n hug when she tell me truth, n tell her she is very good to do so. but I don't say anything when she lies to me. In my opinion, it's not that serious that they lie ab small things.

Xidu

Also, I don't ask my daughter if she throw stones on her brother, coz she will say no I didn't. It will make me unhappy. So I just tell her that don't throw stones, nobody likes to play w kids throw stones.

gcgirl

Is he a compulsive lia?, how is his relationship with his younger brother ?

LadyMayBelle

What is his behaviour like in school OP? Has the teacher identified this behaviour amongst peers and others in authority?

What's he like, say if he stays with grandparents; is the behaviour only with Mum and Dad?

Has anything youve tried worked a bit so far?

Here's an intersting link also for you: http://raisingchildren.net.au/articles/lies.html

jmcc99_98

LadyMayBelle wrote: »

What is his behaviour like in school OP? Has the teacher identified this behaviour amongst peers and others in authority?

What's he like, say if he stays with grandparents; is the behaviour only with Mum and Dad?

Has anything youve tried worked a bit so far?

Here's an intersting link also for you: http://raisingchildren.net.au/articles/lies.html

We had some issues at school, where he was telling lies and had a few tantrums, the teacher suggested a "behaviour book" which the teacher filled out each afternoon at the end of school and we filled in each night when he was going to bed, it was to record his behaviour and lies. This seemed to work after a month or two and the teacher suggested we stop it so it didnt become a routine as opposed to a specific form of disciplining.

He is generally fine with his grandparents becuase he tends not to be disciplined as much i.e. when at his grandparents he never has to be asked to tidy a room or go to bed etc. So it is always positive for him at grandparents, he can watch TV, play outside, go on the computer for a while etc.

He gets on generally well with his brother.

He is a really really good kid at times and can be exceptionally well behaved and is almost always very very polite.

I see some of the other posters seem to think I may be over-reacting, perhaps I am, but Im not prone to over reacting and the situation regarding the lying and the seemingly lack of remorse is really worrying and frustrating. If there is an underlying issue we really want to nip it in the bud.

We dont want to ignore it because we think we are over--reacting only for the behaviour to develop into something more serious as he gets older.

Family life is good, his mum and I rarely fight or argue and certainly not in front of him. He has great grandparents who always make a fuss of him and his brother etc.

LadyMayBelle

You seem fairly clued in alright to your parenitng style and the adverse effects of negativity.
If the behaviour book was effective, why did it stop; was it because his behaviour improved in school?

Have you been able to have a little chat with him in the car or somewhere neutral about why he feels he has to lie, or does he understand what lies are/different types of lies etc? Might be good to exlpore the topic with him as him understanding might be key. Maybe it feels good, maybe lying blocks a feeling; if he says he didnt throw a stone then he doesnt have to get punished.. etc

Id chat to the school too (well, in september) about this issue too. Perhaps they have someone who can give him a few sessions or strategies?

I'd really try an reward the 'truth telling moments' even if they are few and far between and miniscule; even with a chart on the fridge or something. Prepare to be caught out too, if you get the whole family involved it might be good? Normalising telling truths. What's that saying, 'if we always do what we always did, we always get what we always got!'. I['ll have a think.

Good luck. Sounds like a good kid just using lies to help him manage!

Ill have a think OP

Pixie Chief

Ah yes, I remember the days well! It's not that many years since I went through the exact same thing. Even though I was told that it was a stage and he would grow out of it, I worried because it changed slightly how I viewed him and it was dreadful not to be able to believe what my own child was telling me. I also worried that it would permanently change how other people felt about him/saw him if it went on for long enough. Like that, he is an amazing person and I just couldn't understand why he would be like this. Over the course of two and a half years, we tried many interventions, most of which worked briefly but nothing really made any long term difference.

Eventually (I can't believe it took me that long!) I realised that while adults take a long term view and seek to connect pieces of information together, kids pretty much live moment to moment and often struggle to connect events and ideas that happen any distance from each other and essentially he was seeing the situation in a totally different way to me. Most times he lied he got caught out but not every time. So each time he was hoping that he would avoid trouble and wouldn't get caught this time. He didn't see any longer term issues at all.

Seperate to any of these incidences, I explained to him about lying and how it creates a situation where it is very hard for me to believe what he tells me. It did improve things a bit but not much. Then I tried lying to him a couple of times, telling him I had done or bought something when I hadn't and he got very upset and I explained to him that I was trying to show him how it made me and other people feel when he tells lies to me/them. That was actually the turning point but we still had issues. One day when we were having a ice cream together and chatting about stuff, he said to me that he knew I lied too and so did other people so why was it that only he had to tell the truth all the time? I was a bit stunned but realised he was right. Only that morning I had wriggled out of a dinner invitation that I was simply too exhausted to go to by telling the person (on the phone) that I wasn't feeling well. He knew I was fine and therefore I had just lied. I explained that I am very fond of the person that I was talking to but they wouldn't understand or accept an 'I have been working 18 hour days for 9 days straight now between everything' excuse and be hurt and offended. I didn't want them to be hurt and offended so I gave them an excuse that they would understand and accept. I also didn't feel that it was a total lie because I really wasn't feeling great - exhaustion isn't fun either! We had a lot of conversations about social lies and what is considered ok and what isn't and why and I had to be really honest with him. I fessed up that I don't always tell him the whole truth sometimes when he asks me a question because sometimes things are too complicated or inappropriate for him to know just yet but in the future when he asked I would tell him if there were more to it to know later.

Eventually he understood how the whole thing works and we all came to an agreement that while there might be reasons to edit the truth to people outside of our house, there were no reasons to do so inside our family and we all agreed to tell each other the truth about things because that is how people who love each other behave. As a whole, we do pretty much stick to that and our relationship now that he is a teenager is pretty good. A part of that obviously has to be that you don't get mad when people tell you stuff which is actually much harder than it sounds but it works.

Lying is much more complex than blaming someone else if you did something. If it worked for your son even once or twice then he is probably going to keep trying it, at least for a while until his understanding of these things grows. I was horrified to realise that my son heard lots of other people telling lies (in the literal sense) all the time. Other kids told lies in school and got away with it, adults telling social lies all the time. He even accidentally heard his teacher lying (we were in the supermarket and she was on the phone telling someone that she was in work and not able to do something right now!) and couldn't work out how all these people were allowed to do it and he wasn't. We could have stayed punishing him for Ireland and it would never had made any difference. Chances are your son is a good kid, he certainly sounds like it...maybe he just doesn't understand?

God, have been rambling for miles here...sorry about that!

F35

Nice resource
http://webhome.idirect.com/~readon/lies.html


failing that,

"LIAR LIAR PANTS ON FIRE!!!"

jmcc99_98

Thanks F35, Pixie Chief and Lady Maybelle for taking the time to reply.

Pixie, your response is particularly useful/helpful as you have described feelings that both my wife and I have had in relation to the problem.

Again thanks for your replies, and if you have more advice Im all ears

Pixie Chief

jmcc99_98 wrote: »

Thanks F35, Pixie Chief and Lady Maybelle for taking the time to reply.

Pixie, your response is particularly useful/helpful as you have described feelings that both my wife and I have had in relation to the problem.

Again thanks for your replies, and if you have more advice Im all ears

Glad to have helped in any way. I took it very hard at the time and was very upset. It just seemed to go on and on and a lot of people viewed him very harshly which broke my heart completely. If your son is generally a good hearted kid then I wouldn't worry too much, you will find a way......best of luck! Incidentally, it seems to me that you guys are doing a fantastic job, don't forget to remind yourselves of that sometimes!

Jessica-Rabbit

jmcc99_98 wrote: »

I hope someone might be able to help me by offering some advice.

My wife and I have two boys, 8 and 3.

The 8 year old is going through a period (About a year) where he is constantly lying - I could watch him throw a stone and say to him, did you throw that stone and he will deny it, I will say I saw him etc etc , he just keeps denying it over and over again. Eventually he will admit it but not until there is a huge drama.

Generally he is not bold as such but will take zero responsibility for anything - EVERYTHING is blamed on the three year old.

He will be punished for misbehaving, e.g. sent to his room, TV taken away for a while, friends not allowed visit etc, this usually causes major drama. When the punishment ends he will be acting as if nothing ever happened and is likely to turn around and repeat the exact same behaviour again.

As I type I know it may sound trivial but it really is beginning to wear us down - it is a constant battle with him to tell the truth.

I gets lots of positive attention from my wife and I and very often is taken away on his own for treats, without his little brother etc. So he is getting attention.

I am happy to bring his to see a specialist about his behaviour, but at the same time I am afraid it might legitimise his behaviour, i.e. he is highly intelligent and can be quite manipulative. I can see him then misbehaving and blaming it on there being "something wrong with him" and "its not his fault"

This is made all the more worrying due to the fact that my wife is pregnant and due in 4 months and she does not need the stress either.

Is this lying normal? If not who should I speak to? Where does one go? i.e. a psychologist, a psychiatrist, a counsellor ???

Im not sure if this helps, but when I was little my brother and I were constantly passing the blame, there is 4 yrs between us and as he is the older one I learned it from him.
We weren't badly behaved children, but we would just blame each other for little things ie, if something got broken ( by accident) or who ate all the cookies,
We are both grown up now and I am a very honest person. I always take responsibility for my actions. My advice would be keep doing what you are doing and in time this will pass, also I would explain to him how it makes you feel when he lies and emphasize the importance of trust. As long as the lies aren't big then he will be fine.

January

Please don't post in that size again.

Jessica-Rabbit

January wrote: »

Please don't post in that size again.

was that for me January or the OP?

biko

Everyone lies, it's a part of life.
Hopefully your boy will grow out of it or learn that it isn't on.

Reading this thread reminded me of Koko the gorilla.
Koko, an actual gorilla that could sign to her keepers, once tore a sink from a wall in her cage.
When questioned by her keeper she signed "the cat did it".

Koko had a companion kitten, that she now blamed for the broken sink...

freshpopcorn

Most children lie and blame their siblings for doing stuff that they did.
Try and not worry to much about it.

Glinda

Something that isn't a complete answer but definitely helps while you deal with the lying as a separate issue (and lots of kids go through a phase of this) is to avoid putting him in a situation where he feels 'trapped' into lying. For example, if you know he threw a stone at his sister don't ask him if he did it. You already know he did, so just deal with that behaviour, rather than introducing another layer (expecting him to 'own up'). In this example that would mean rebuking him for throwing the stone without asking him questions.

You can deal with lying when it is the only thing he is doing wrong (maybe if he told all his friends you were going to the moon on holidays or something) and this separates it from other behaviours that he is 'in trouble' for.

In my experience, being asked rhetorical questions about something you have done wrong is shaming, even for adults. This is why we do it to the 'wrongdoer' rather than because we are seeking answers. I think your son might be having trouble coping with this and needs to be dealt with in a completely straightforward way ("Don't take biscuits without asking Daddy first" rather than "Did you take a biscuit without asking Daddy" etc.)

Of course I may be completely wrong about your situation and apologies if this is so, it is just something I have found very helpful in the past

jmcc99_98

Glinda wrote: »

Something that isn't a complete answer but definitely helps while you deal with the lying as a separate issue (and lots of kids go through a phase of this) is to avoid putting him in a situation where he feels 'trapped' into lying. For example, if you know he threw a stone at his sister don't ask him if he did it. You already know he did, so just deal with that behaviour, rather than introducing another layer (expecting him to 'own up'). In this example that would mean rebuking him for throwing the stone without asking him questions.

You can deal with lying when it is the only thing he is doing wrong (maybe if he told all his friends you were going to the moon on holidays or something) and this separates it from other behaviours that he is 'in trouble' for.

In my experience, being asked rhetorical questions about something you have done wrong is shaming, even for adults. This is why we do it to the 'wrongdoer' rather than because we are seeking answers. I think your son might be having trouble coping with this and needs to be dealt with in a completely straightforward way ("Don't take biscuits without asking Daddy first" rather than "Did you take a biscuit without asking Daddy" etc.)

Of course I may be completely wrong about your situation and apologies if this is so, it is just something I have found very helpful in the past

Thats very useful and interesting, we have tried this approach with varying degrees of success. We have said "Dont take a biscuit without asking Daddy" instead of confronting him and forcing the truth, however even this approach has resulted in him flying off the handle saying "ah you always blame me etc etc etc"

We are doing our best to use this approach and to stick with it. I have also begun to think that we are part of the problem i.e. we confront him and demand a truthful answer which escalates the situation and backs him into a corner, we have tried to avoid this and have seen some positive results.

Fingers crossed - Thanks to you all for your advice, I greatly appreciate it

shelly22

You should explain to him how lieing makes you feel, sad, disappointed ect.. Then when you you know he is lieing you can say . I am very disappointed that you feel you had to lie to me. it makes me very sad that you feel like you need to lie to me. When you know he tells you the truth tell him how responsible he is for telling you the truth and how proud you are of him and praise him. Tell him he is getting very responsible for telling the truth He will love the praise feel more grown up.