Lying part of BPD?

[Think About It...]

Is lying a big part of BPD?  My ds lies when the truth would do more good. 

It's like if he says the wall is white, I need to look.

[More than sad]

Is lying a big part of BPD?  My ds lies when the truth would do more good. 

It's like if he says the wall is white, I need to look.

[Battle Weary]

I've heard that the lies are one of the biggest complaints family members have about pwBPD.  My dd lies a lot, often about trivial things like borrowing my hair dryer.  It's not like I'll get upset with her for taking it, but I need that dryer because my hair is dripping wet! A few months ago she lied to her BF's mother about her religion.  She lies about bigger things like denying stealing, but that one I understand.  Others I don't get are lies about things like applying for or getting a job when she hasn't.  My theory is that she lies when something about a situtation or a question triggers potential stress and the lie is a way to avoid experiencing the stress.  Weirdly, she volunteers information other kids would surely lie about or keep hidden from their parents like smoking pot or attending parties where kids were drinking. 

[Reality]

Same here, Battle Weary
My BPDs23 is very honest and open about so much of his life, but he seems almost delusional when he is discussing situations in which he has a huge emotional investment to appear a certain way.  It is as if he is creating his reality somehow differently than the average person.  The emotional dysregulation and distress wrecks the thinking process, so the only way to operate is in a knee-jerk fashion.  I would think you would need your reality paradigm to make sense for you, so if you have to 'lie' to make it all look somehow like it fits together, so be it.  I would think lies are preferable to going crazy.  I bet the lies would make perfect sense, if there was complete understanding of the disorder.
I have a strong sense that parts of the BPDbrains are not fully developed yet.  If you lived in an agrarian society, this wouldn't have mattered so much.  Lots of exercise till you dropped boosting endorphins.  Plus it was normal for very young people to be making babies with extended families caring for the younger still. 
This is a modern disorder.
Reality

[Battle Weary]

Reality,
Very insightful about the lying, not to mention that disordered thinking that is not a lie but simply a result of distorted perception.  My dd will say something has been going on for years when it only came up in the last year.  I used to try to argue the facts on these occasions but no longer bother because the distortions have become a part of her reality.  So much more productive to simply validate whatever she is feeling and glide over the mis-statements.

[heronbird]

Yes, there has been this topic on here recently. It was one of the first things I wanted to know, youll all understand that. I rang her P to ask him, he wouldnt talk to me, so bad dont you think. I had no where to go to ask at the time. He said he didnt want to speak to me because it might be difficult when he meets with her ? ?

The lies just shock me, I dont even think she knows she si doing it, its not like normal lying even.
Yesterday, we were talking about her doing voluntary work again, I suggested working for a pregnancy crisis centre, she said oh no way, its there fault they got pregnant, and I wouldnt have the pacience to listen to why they keep having sex, they wouldnt be there if they didnt have sex. Haha so funny, saying that she doesnt? ?

Does she really not know shes done all the things shes done. I used it as an opportunity to say, well its not always that simple, same as homeless people.
It messes with my head a bit so confussing.

[Violet719]

This has been my biggest problem with my D19.  She has been lying since the age of 13 at least.  As others have said, it's not rational. Rational people sometimes lie to avoid consequences or to make themselves look good. That would be understandable, at least. PwBPD lie in the face of concrete proof that they are lying. They lie over things that don't matter.  I think they are like little children, who do it in the hopes that saying something will make it true. Denying something will make it go away.  In the emotion of the moment, the first thing that comes to mind is to save face or make reality fit their emotional defenses.  In that way, they lie to themselves as well as others.  It's really sad, because dishonesty is more destructive than anything else in a relationship.  What hope is there for friendship, love, or family support when they can't trust or be trusted?

I have learned to defend myself. I don't assume that anything she says is true. I try to tell myself my DD's lies aren't any more personal or significant than the ones her 3 year old son tells ("I didn't pee in my pants" when he did).  It's hard though, because she isn't 3 years old.  She is old enough to know what she is doing. I have discussed this with her and reassured her that no truth can be as bad as lying to cover it up.  She just doesn't care and doesn't see why anyone else should either.

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[j's friend]

Battleweary I was just wondering If the lies are a result of distorted perception, why is it that my dd will go ballistic when she is confronted with them. Often she will either get really agitated, angry,cry, try to leave or resort to violence.
I would have thought that if it is her real perception of how events have occured then she wouldnt need to become so defensive?
One thing I know is that if you tell the truth the truth never changes.

[Battle Weary]

j's friend,
At least in my dd's case there are lies and there are distorted perceptions.  Confronting her with her lies does make her ballistic--she gets very stressed.  But it is different for distorted perceptions.  In her case, her sense of time or how hard she has really tried at something can be way off.  For a few days for example, she will empty out the trash.  This becomes how much she helps around the house because she is always emptying out the trash.  Well, yes--the last few days--but always?  If I say, "but you just started emptying out the trash", she does not get upset; rather she seems genuinely confused because somehow her most recent actions seem to her like a continuation of a long-term pattern (that never existed).  So I refrain from a correction of the perception--there's nothing useful that would come of it--but rather say something validating like "I really appreciate your helping out by noticing the trash is full and empyting it out." 

I also now resist the temptation to point out that while emptying the trash is nice, it really does not constitute major household help.  A response I might have formerly made to her comment about how much she is helping out would have been something like "Ok--it's nice you take the trash out, but it would be even nicer if you did the dishes/ cleaned the bathrooms/ did the laundry."  Can't believe how invalidating I used to be! And not only would those things not have got done, but the trash wouldn't have got emptied either.

[More than sad]

Violet719,

I too don't assume anything is true; I even posted a sticky note on my computer with he lies.  I also try not to
take the lies personally like you wouldn't with a small child.   My dd is 39; it is hard to convince myself that he is really like a very small child.
Worse yet, to contemplate that he may never be anything but a small child in terms of emotional maturity.

My dd has such a thin skin that almost anything said can be perceived as "judgment", "criticism" , especially in periods of rising paranoia. 

Does anyone have a secret when it comes to confronting the lies without pulling down the walls?

LadyLinnet

[mikmik]

Lady Linnet,

It is so hard to impose rationality on irrational people.  It is a balance I fight every day with my d.  However, I wonder to some degree if lying starts as a defense, and continues because it works.  Do they know on some level that we are "afraid" of the rages, and try not to trigger them and therefore don't call them out on their lies regularly?  It fits the manipulation part of BPD. 

mikmik

[peaceplease]

Yes, I believe lying is a big part of BPD.  My dd has even admitted to having a lying problem. 

And, the stories that she has made up, and I felt so foolish for falling for them.  One time she told me that she was the victim of identity theft.  Someone broke into her house, and stole her idea.  That is why her name was in the paper for shoplifting.  It wasn't her, it was somebody pretending to be her. ?  And, I fell for it at first. 

She lies to defend herself.  She has lied on FB about having a job.  And, she lied one time about us making cookies, together.  The baking was at a time that we were not getting alon .  So, I guess that it was fantasy.  And, she fantasized about having a job.  No, wait, that was two jobs.  I would like to believe that she has let up a bit on the lying,  However, I still hear some lies coming out her mouth.

What I find amusing, is when she starts a sentence with, "I am not going to lie..."

peaceplease

[ontherox]

Battle Weary you hit on a point that I hadn’t really thought about: The difference between lying and having a distorted perception of reality.  My dd18 does the same this ALWAYS is or that ALWAYS is. I used to say she makes the exceptions the rule.  I agree that treating the two things differently is the way to go; she definitely reacts differently to being caught in a lie.  One interesting thing she does is even when she’s caught red handed she will deny the lie to the death.  It may be that she really thinks she’s right I don’t know, but it’s infuriating to have to call out every detail of a very obvious lie to her.  I will give this more thought.  Thanks.

[cfh]

I believe lying...even about things not worth lying about is part of BPD.  So is grandiosity ie my ds telling strangers that he just got back from Afghanistan and actually telling war stories.  My ds lies so much that I just assume it's not true.  I've gone so far as to "unfriend" him on Facebook because his postings were so upsetting to read.  When he asked me why I told him the truth.  He too has admitted that he has a problem with lying.

[j's friend]

yes my d will lie about anything and everything. She has even admitted that she doesnt know why she lies, but it seems to also be based on fantasy or manipulation.DD has it on her FB that she was born in another country. We have never been to that country, but she has told people that we left that country when she was a baby and that we speak that countries language at home!.She even went on to study that countries language at school to keep up the pretence.Atm she has a friend who is pregnant, but dd has been telling these boys she wants to stay with her that SHE is pregnant with their baby and how she can feel it move and kick, and recently she has been asking family members to back her up in her lies

[Battle Weary]

j's friend,

Amazing.  My dd has asked me to lie for her too and say I did something, which I never in my right mind would do.  And i have eceived a tring of invectives for refusing to comply. But nothing as major as going along with a pretend pregnancy! I do admire your dd's persistence in going so far as to study a foreign languge to preserve her cover--mine would never be so industrious.  My DH is foreign and dd has told people that she is from that country or a nearby one and that our religion is the dominant one in that area even though our family religion is different.  Her BF is amazingly tolerant, but he was really bothered when he found out our religion was not the religion DD had told his mother it was.

[More than sad]

Boy the stories sounds familiar.  Son has lied about being in the military for a long time and getting medals and such.  Actually, he
was mustered out after one week because of panic attacks and mental illness.  He has lied about having jobs and talking about what he did at the job that night, etc.  The pay check never showed up.

He lied about having a son by a previous girlfriend, he gave the lad a name, lied about going to visit the child, lied about taking the child to see his biological father.  He's lied about being sober (at one time for years, talking about going to meetings, about picking up his chip for his AA birthday). 

Just recently, he snooped through my e-mail and when I challenged him, looked straight at me and lied.  He lies about trivia---I went to bed at 9 and slept all night till the alarm went off---and I would have e-mails from him during that sound sleep and he'd be on Facebook during that sound sleep.

I usually just ask myself how important is it?   Some lies are important and some are just dumb.  He is also good at telling me what I'd like to hear and that is my problem.   I look to find a reason to believe.

LadyLinnet

[heronbird]

I think my dd lies about things she is ashamed of. I thought she had two different personalities at one point because of the lies, and I thought she really believed what she was saying, you will all understand that.
The sadest thing with all of the lies is that I feel I cant ever have a proper relationship with her because she has to hide things from me a lot, I guess lots of teens do that a bit, Im sure my son does not tell us things, but its different, anyway my son is not that close to me.

I mean, I have stopped asking where dd is, who has she been with and just normal stuff like that which is bit sad really.

[j's friend]

The sadest thing with all of the lies is that I feel I cant ever have a proper relationship with her because she has to hide things from me a lot, I guess lots of teens do that a bit, Im sure my son does not tell us things, but its different, anyway my son is not that close to me.

I mean, I have stopped asking where dd is, who has she been with and just normal stuff like that which is bit sad really.

I feel exactly the same Heronbird.Most of the time it just feels like Iam living with a stranger. ?

[cbcrna1]

Problem was, before I knew about BPD, my dd distortions, perceptions and lies were somehow true to me.  I thought there must be some truth to what she is saying and feeling.  I would be so confused trying diligently to figure out what was going on. I have learned so much, now I think about only what she feels, not about what she says as being true.  I will have to say that what she says sows seeds of infection in my family as they try hard to see the truth in what she says.  It can be destructive.  As I grow in my knowledge of BPD and there is distance in my dd's way and my way of reacting and communicating, my family begins to "see" also.

[Neverknow]

Constantly.  About things that are completely inconsequential. And, is constantly getting mad if I don't back up her lies to her parents and others.

And, at times, will even talk about it and say she doesn't know why she lies all of the time. 

And, of course, gets mad because I don't believe anything she says that I can't corroborate independently.

And, as I write this, I wonder what is wrong with me to put up with it.