AboutBj Hickman Expertise I am an interventionist and a certified addictions specialist. I can answer questions and offer advice regarding relationships with parents and teenagers, including but not limited to cases involving drug or alcohol abuse, eating disorders, sexual abuse, and divorce. I enjoy teaching parents how to prepare themselves for their child becoming a teenager and assuaging their fears of those "dreaded teenage years". I want parents to know they can not only survive those years, but they can actually enjoy them!
Experience I am the mother of two grown children, 30 and 28. My husband and I have been married for 32 years. We have 31 years experience counseling parents and teenagers. We have learned some things along the way and often are asked to speak to groups on parent/teenager relationships. We also lead a seminar for teenagers on suicide awareness. However, what I feel makes me most qualified is our own children with whom we enjoy close and open relationships. Our kids are well-rounded, high functioning adults who are caring and are often sought out for advice from their friends and their friends' parents.
Question My 18 year old son lies continually about everything; not just to stay out of trouble, but even to his friends and family members about things that don't matter. When you catch him and call him on it, he won't admit to the lie. He's a good kid other than this huge flaw. It's making me (his father) feel differently about him, so I can only imagine that this will cause him many problems in the future. Any suggestions?
Answer I'm not really sure why some kids do this. Sometimes I think it's more about ego/insecurity than anything else...especially when they're caught and can't own up to it. They're too insecure in themselves to just stop and say, "You're right. I'm sorry."
My nephew had this problem, and one day his uncle, whom he greatly admired, started calling him out by teasing him about it. Instead of just letting it pass like most people had grown accustomed to doing with him, his uncle just started questioning the validity of things my nephew said. It embarrassed him enough to make him stop and see what was happening. He came to me about it, and I talked to him about how when we exaggerate, stretch the truth, or out and out lie, we wear down our integrity. Over time, people just begin to not believe anything we say because they know the truth isn't of high value to us. I asked him if he could pinpoint why he lied to begin with, and it turned out he didn't think people trusted what he had to say so he felt like he had to embellish it to be worthy of being heard. What he came to realize is that he was making things worse and destroying any trust his family and friends had in him.
Maybe if you take the time to talk to your son about this...approach it from a standpoint of "What can I do to help you with this because I'm worried about how it's going to affect you in your relationships and in your future?" It's so easy to just get frustrated with our kids when they don't do right but we often fail to realize they may just not know how!
Getting to the "why" will help him to understand not only the value of changing this behavior but how to do so. Start there. Your son is more likely to listen to you if you approach it from this standpoint, and your relationship will hopefully be strengthened through this process rather than damaged further.
