16 yr old and lying

[KKMAGS]

My 16-year-old son is ADHD is has a habit of lying. We are wondering what to do about this habit or better understand what is behind the lying. He recently went off his ADHD meds, however, this was happening before going off the meds.

[Onthemove1971]

I know this is a hard thing to talk about thanks for speaking opening about it. We have the same issue with our 11 year old.

I assume it really is about avoidance to get out of doing things, right?

We try to really talk about trust with him and also our psychologist tells us not to try and "catch" him lying.

For example we are having an issue with our son eating lunch at school. He will say Yes I eat Pizza today, pepperoni, when we go look at his account he has not even bought water. So instead of asking him "did you eat lunch at school? We just look at his account now and then say, we see you didn't eat lunch today... And give him an larger snack. We try to counsel him on the importance of eating and hope this phase will pass. We are also giving food from home becuase when he doesn't eat he gets. Migraines..

Fun times..

Not what you are struggling with but we find having him go to a counselor really helps with issues in addition to being on medication that is very taylored to his physical make up.

Hope this helps..

[KKMAGS in reply to Onthemove1971]

He is starting to see a counselor and instead of eating lunch at school he wants to go for lunch with his friends. So we give him $5.00/ day for lunch from the money he has earned. However he tends to over spend and doesn’t want to work to earn any. There is the problem with lying and taking money.

[dredoug02]

My 7 year old son had this problem for sometime. What I learned is I cannot ask him not to lie to me if I am going to be upset with him if he tells me the truth. This approach have worked tremendously.

[Pajamasam36]

My 14 year old has had this problem since he started to talk. I agree with onthemove it is definitely about avoidance. We have had so many talks about being honest and it impacts him at the moment then he forgets again.

He has put up notes on his mirror and dressers in his room that say I WILL BE HONEST. I don’t know if they help or not because he is still lying but we always tell him that it is a lie and that we cannot give him more privileges if we cannot trust him. We talk a lot about privileged that will be coming his way like driving a car or going on dates or keeping his cell phone things we know he wants to do and have. Honesty with self is critical. We explain to him that self is the most important to treat well and being honest is the very best thing we can do for self.

We explain that all long term success comes from being honest. We know it is hard for him because he wants what he wants. He wants to drink caffeine he lies all the time about this and makes up elaborate stories to convince me that he has not been drinking caffeine in swig sodas.

We explain that caffeine exasperates his Tourettes.

He said well Doctor Brill said it helps my ADHD. I said well Dr Hollingsworth said you take prescription drug stimulants in place of caffeine because they are more effective. We Studdies this more and have found that we will not allow him to drink caffeine because there are better ways for him to get this stimulant.It is no use he does what he wants anyway but we keep on fighting the fight of honesty because we love him and we explain to him that we want him to be a father one day who can keep a job and provide for his family. If his boss finds out that he lies he will fire him.

We watch a movie called courageous all the time. It’s about cops and their families and how important being honest and having integrity is. I reccomend you buy it and watch it often together.

There are moments when I want to quit fighting the honesty fight but I feel it is just too important.

We hold Family home evenings on Monday nights and we each take turns teaching a lesson. We teach about honesty in as many creative ways we can.

I WILL teach him how important his principle is before he leaves my home!! I will never quit (I may get weary and complaint ) I will never surrender to his lying!!

Best of luck! Just know you are not alone!!

[reg2018]

There are few different things that come into play with lying/honesty and adhd and why a child does it.

1. Lying behavior can occur because a child is trying to avoid punishment. There's that chance they can get out of it. The chance might be slim, but there's still a chance.

The impulse to do things/have something in the moment outweighs the value the child places on honesty.

2. Lying versus memory/attention gaps: "Lying" can occur because a child doesn't know what the truth is, but they're filling in what they believe is the truth, or what they want to be the truth. One of my boys has a hard time remembering things and another son believes he's always right.

When these two get into an argument and then try to tell me what happened it's had to know what the truth is because one is likely filling in the blanks of his memory and the other is mentally rewriting history according to what will paint him in a rosier light. Both are convinced of their "truth."

From a parent point of view it looks like lying, but from the child's point of view they may actually believe they are telling the truth as they see it.

3. Lying about tasks: When a child doesn't know how to complete a task, or a task seems too overwhelming it can be easier to lie and say it's done than to admit it isn't done.

For more information and tips on lying behavior check out this article: understood.org/en/learning-...

[KKMAGS in reply to reg2018]

Thanks for the link to the helpful article. I will take a look. My son was adopted out of foster care at the age of 4. So I also believe that there are underlying issues that we have not looked at before that could be playing into his lying. Issues of safety and belonging. Not sure. Also, the pressure of having the responsibility of having a car where he needed to pay for the gas was too big of a responsibility for him at this time. I don't enjoy checking up on his stories, however, I know I have to keep checking or he gets himself into trouble. Thanks to all that have responded. I just have to stay vigilant with him.

[reg2018]

Three of my boys are adopting out of fostercare and they all have RAD (reactive attachment disorder) which deals with attachment and trust. This can play a part in all kinds of behavior that children would lie about because the child is trying to maintain control over his or her life. It's hard for them to trust others because the trusted adults in their life didn't take care of them as they should have.