7 Year Old Lying

I agree with Nicole P. You have to actually have a consequence for lying, not just letting her know she's disappointed you.

I agree that she should lose the activity for that day of the Advent calendar and also that she should spend the weekend in her room for lying. If you keep brushing it under the rug, she's going to keep doing it and it's going to get worse.

Kids need and want solid boundaries. I don't think you're providing that.

"My kids don't really even GET in trouble. We DO let them know when they disappoint us, but they are generally really well behaved and their "trouble" usually means a time out or going to their room for a very short period of time etc."

That's your problem. I think she's in dire need of a serious punishment for lying. If I had been there for the Advent calender lying fiasco I would have said, "Because you opened the calendar early after I expressly told you not to you will lose the item inside. And because you LIED about it you are GROUNDED."

Then take away all her favorite things. Make her STAY in her room except for meals for a couple of days. Lying is absolutely 100% NOT something I will tolerate at all. I would put her on bread and water until she's begging to tell the truth.

My kid knows the story of "the boy who cried wolf" backwards and forwards and when something gets broken or spilled or goes wrong in the house... she now no longer blames the cat or makes up stories. I punish lying far more severely than I would punish any small infraction of house rules because it's extremely important to me that she is honest. I told her that if she lies to me about something as stupid as who spilled the milk... how can I trust her when she tells me something important?

I proved to her how horrible it is to not be trusted when she had done something she was proud of a day after she lied to me big time. She came to me and announced that she had drawn a picture that was the most awesome picture in the whole world. She presented it to me and I told her I didn't believe she drew it.

She looked at me like I was nuts. I told her that since she lied to me about what her teacher told her to do yesterday (because she didn't want to do the work) and I believed her and then the teacher contacted me to ask why she hadn't completed her work, that I was having a very hard time believing her now. She tried to prove that she drew the picture but I was adamant that I still wasn't sure that she had actually done it until she broke down into tears and stomped her little foot and said she was "very very angry" with me.

I got down to her level, made eye contact and explained that what she was experiencing was a lack of trust. I told her TRUST was very important in a family. I want to TRUST that what she tells me is true but it's hard to TRUST someone who LIES. Liars can not be trusted!

So far as I know, she hasn't blatantly lied to my face ever again. Until your daughter can experience what it's like to lose your trust, she won't know how bad it is to lie. Right now all she knows is that it winds you up like a top and makes you angry. As of right now, SHE doesn't suffer from her lies, YOU do.

Make HER suffer for them and she'll stop.

Kids lie because they don't want to get in trouble, and they don't want to disappoint their parents.
It doesn't mean they are bad, or that they are going to grow up and be dishonest people. It's just a normal part of childhood.
Stop making such a big deal out of it, otherwise it could backfire and she may end up using as a way to get your attention.
And crying over it shows her how just powerful lying can be (wow, I can make my M. cry!) Is that REALLY the example you want to set?

i would lie to if coming clean after lying meant no punnishment?

did i understand that right. if she does something wrong and gets caught without lying there is a time out
if she lies and confesses her lie=no time out??

honestly i've caught emmy who is 6 in one or two lies, and done the same thing...are you sure you dont want to rethink that statement because lying is bad and she always does but she's not done anything bad enough to actually lie yet

Also if Emmy tells and embelished tale from school or about something that isnt her protecting herself i chalk it up to being a kid and perceiving things differently at times, or jus having fun and making it a tall tale. i did that when i was little too/. if she was lying to avoid getting in trouble thats when she;d be in big trouble

Does she get in trouble for the lying? If I understand this right, if she does something naughty and tells you the truth she doesn't get in trouble - Right? But does she get in trouble when she lies? Obviously you talk to her about it all the time, which is good, but is there a consequence for lying? Maybe make up a separate "chart" just for lying (I know you said something about having an activity chart). Every day she goes without lying she builds up points for getting something. OR every day that she tells a lie she loses something on the activity chart. She might not be able to do fun activities for a while but she'll eventually get the idea

I have always told my kids that lying will get them in more trouble than any thing they could do wrong would. Sometimes, being honest will get you a talking to but lying will get you punished for sure. For example, you break curfew...sure you might be in trouble or you might just get a warning...you lie to me as to why and you definately have consequences.

Start showing her that you mean business and execute consequences when you know she's lying and double check when you aren't sure (and let her know that you may double check so she best be honest). Show her that until she can be honest (and you can trust that she is being honest since she has broken that trust), you need verification on EVERYTHING.

NYMetroMom's post captures it perfectly imho, so I'm not going to re-state the same thing.

I used to get myself worked up about stuff like this when my kids were little, and somehow they have grown up to be really nice, respectable, honorable young men who make me proud every day.

This, too, shall pass.

Hang in there.

I think we both know this is directly connected to your own struggles with your M.. You have a heightened fear of being deceived and your radar is up a bit too sensitive. Start over yet again. Take your crying and emotion out of it. You are making things too big of a deal. If she gets hung for every little thing then she is going to believe she is bad. Then anything will go for her because you are just going to be mad and think she is fundamentally flawed anyway.

Give her chances that will begin with your trust. Tell her, when she starts her story, I believe you because I choose to believe that you wouldn't lie to me and you are a little girl with character. If these are truly lies over the littlest things then don't sweat it. Treat it casually. Keep reassuring her that she is good and will choose to do what's right because of it.

Kids will live up to or down to the reputation you give them. Always round up.

At this age, there can be a difference between lying and fantasy.

If your daughter makes up a story about school, it can just be imagination.
Now, if she says that Johnny pushed her down and Johnny gets in trouble when he never touched her, that's a different story. A "lie" that hurts or harms someone else is not okay. Ever.

We all walk a fine line, don't we? A friend gets a hair cut and hopes for compliments when you are thinking, "What the heck did you do to yourself?"
We say it looks great and are glad they're happy. Right?

I always told my kids that when it came to me, I might be mad if they told me the truth, but I would be FAR madder if I found out they had lied to me. And, I emphasized that I would ALWAYS find out.

You see, my kids were not good liars. My nephew, God bless him, we all joked amongst ourselves that we were glad he wasn't even smart enough to come up with a good lie. He was smart, don't get me wrong, but "You're not going to believe this, but a bird flew in my window and that's why the stuff on my shelf got knocked down".

Hmmm. There's a screen on the window. No way a bird could get in. Nobody was going to fall for that story. Was it a "lie"? Of course it was. Was he being devious? Not necessarily. He didn't want to admit that he had been goofing off and throwing a ball in his room.

Look, you know when your kid isn't telling the truth. I don't know that tears and punishments are always in order.

My son was fairly young and dragging his feet about getting ready for school. He came to me with a thermometer and said, "You better look at it. According to this I am technically really sick".
I looked at it. I said, "Ummm, according to this, you are technically DEAD, so I advise you to get dressed and, don't let the water get so hot when you run the thermometer under it. Better luck next time."

He was shocked that I knew what he'd done. I just told him that I knew every trick in the book. And, he believed it. It turned out that one of his friends told him about putting the thermometer on a light bulb to make the temperature go up. Like I said, my kids were not good liars. I handled most of it with humor because they never lied about anything super serious or devious. Hey....once you're busted, there's no point in fibbing any longer.

Your daughter shouldn't have to "promise" that she's not lying when you already know she is or she's simply making something up.

You should try to put your trust issues with your mother aside. Your daughter is only 7 and none of that has anything to do with her.

Child psychologists have told me that children often "lie" about things they WISH were true. Your daughter may WISH that she hadn't messed with the Advent calendar and got caught, but she did.

I think it's important to talk to little kids about what they WISH was true and what really is true. Maybe take the emphasis off of the "lying" part.
Whatever you've been doing the past year isn't working.

There's nothing wrong with imagination. It can be great if directed properly.
And, there's nothing wrong with a kid saying, "M., I wish I hadn't done that, but I did." If your trust issues are spilling over onto her, that's not going to change things the way you are hoping.

This is just my opinion and I wish you well.