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Tips on Teens #014
All Teenagers Lie… Often! | ||
| February 2008 | ||
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The topic of this article will either offer you a great sense
of relief or a surprising smack in the face of stunned surprise. Relief because it validates that your teen is not the onlycheatin’ liar in the adolescent world. However, if you are still feeling that stinging sensation on your cheek, it may be because
your teen is very good at lying to you.
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How can you say that about my little “Pookie?” My teenager is a good boy! And I’ll
have you know that he’s an honor student and we’ve always taught him that honesty is the best policy. Being a “good kid” and
an honors student does not preclude Pookie or any other teenager from lying. These attributes are not mutually exclusive. Conversely, being a teenager and lying often go hand-in-hand. Teaching your kid the virtue of honesty is a wonderful thing
to pass on. However, like most other learned skills, teens will struggle with practicing how and when to tell a lie. | ||
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Telling a lie does not necessarily make one a liar. We all lie from
time to time. For example, most of you reading this article have called in sick to work when you weren’t really sick; lied to
friends about some sort of little emergency to get out of inconvenient dinner plans; or perhaps fibbed about the extent of freeway
traffic to cover up for sleeping in too late and keeping others waiting. Some people refer to these as white-lies. We
use these not to hurt others but instead they are usually spoken to protect the feelings of those who we lie to. Lies cover
up for our mistakes and help us avoid responsibility, because sometimes it’s just more convenient than telling the truth. As
an adult hopefully you have a fairly good grasp of when it is appropriate to tell the occasional fib so no one gets hurt. You
have this skill because you have practiced it your entire life and now you know how to wield this power safely. Your teenager
on the other hand, is not as deft at telling the harmless lie. It is very difficult for her to delineate between what is and
is not appropriate because she hasn’t had enough practice. | ||
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But my child should never lie to me… ever! | ||
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Technically, you’re probably right. By the same token however, you should never lie to your mother-in-law by saying how much you just love her Beef-Liver and Velveeta
Cheese Casserole Lathered with a Miracle-Whip Frosting. But you do lie because telling her the truth is just too painful and
embarrassing to have to deal with. When your teen lies to you (and he will), it is generally not done with the intention
of hurting you. More than likely, he is trying to protect you from getting your feelings hurt. After all, if your feelings
get hurt, you will most likely say, “NO!” That “NO!” will promptly be followed with an intolerable lecture, mindless yelling and perhaps a reduction of privileges that he does not want to have to deal with. If he can get away with his lie, it’s a win-win situation in his mind. Not only is he happy because he gets to do what he wants without getting in trouble, but you’re happy because you don’t know about his personal leap into individuality. | ||
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Are you saying that lying about breaking rules
and taking unnecessary risks contribute to her attempt to find her own “individuality?” | ||
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Yes. They may not be advisable, healthy
or safe ways to do it but they are a part of her struggle to find an identity. Remember, your teen’s primary developmental task
is to explore and discover an identity throughout her adolescence. In so doing, your teenager will try very hard to impose her
independence onto the world… that starts with you. That means that she is not always going to agree with what she thinks
are your outdated and stupid rules. She’s going to want to test her boundaries and see if she really can go onto websites that
you don’t like and get away with it, or go to the mall with the cool kids instead of studying at her friend’s house like she told
you. These little (some not so little) tests are her attempts to figure out how she fits in the world around her. | ||
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So what
am I supposed to do… turn a blind eye to dishonesty? | ||
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No, you shouldn’t ignore your teen’s lies; that could very well embolden him to
keep doing it. Check out the following tips and see if they can work for you: | ||
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So
there’s no miracle cure that makes them stop lying to me? | ||
| Thankfully there isn’t. Your kid needs you to set these boundaries to test herself against. Without these tests of wills with you, your teen would never have a safe place to practice and fail in learning how to live in the world. After all, when she grows up and has a family of her own, you want your child to know how to effectively lie to her mother-in-law about how she really appreciates her decorating advice. | ||
| If you would like more information,
please feel free to call for a complimentary phone consultation: | ||
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Kent Toussaint, MA Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (818) 983-7728 | ||
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Remember that adolescence is a temporary mental disorder and will pass within a few years. | ||
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Copyright 2006 - 2009, Kent Toussaint, MA MFT | ||
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