She lied...and I am so angry and sick...

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-09-2000
She lied...and I am so angry and sick...
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Wed, 08-01-2007 - 4:17pm

DD is 17. She is a very good student, athlete, and basically all-around nice kid. We are fortunate that she has given us very little trouble. We have seen little of her this summer because she has two jobs. Last weekend, for the first time all summer, she had the whole weekend off. She asked us if she could go shopping to an outlet mall a couple of hours away and then stay overnight with her girlfriend. I dropped her off at her friend's house at noon on Saturday and they returned to our house about 10 the next morning. From everything I heard, they went shopping together.

I found out today that not only did she not go shopping, she wasn't with her friend. She was in a completely different town with different people. I don't even know who these people are. I don't know where she stayed. She does not know yet that I know she lied. I am just sick.

What am I supposed to do?

Julie

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iVillage Member
Registered: 07-21-2006
Wed, 08-01-2007 - 4:34pm

Julie,

Well, you started off your post about how good your dd has been to this point, and you said that she is responsible (i.e. two jobs). Having said that, is there some reason she would now lie to you? Rather than being angry, I think I would be puzzled. Perhaps you could casually mention (in a non-accusatory way) that you heard she did not go shopping or spend the night with her friend as she said she was going to, and is there anything she would like to tell you? Of course, if she said no, then you would have to take it from there. On the other hand, have you "forbidden" her to go to certain places or to do certain things? Is she afraid of being punished? I hope some more folks will stop by soon to give you their advice. In the meantime, big hugs! I think we have all had experience with our teens lying at some time or another. This particular situation with your dd just sounds like something is "off" compared to her typical behavior.

Amelia

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Wed, 08-01-2007 - 4:55pm

I have never had a problem with just saying what I know and taking it from there. Honestly, I have done that when I DIDNT know but very strongly suspected. My kids never asked how I knew-I think my certainty(and I speak with certainty)throws them so off guard they just respond.

That would be my tactic.

"You werent at ____s Sat-you were in_______. " See what she says. Don't have an apologetic tone to your voice and dont act hurt. Just act confident!

Personally, I believe we rarely catch our kids the first time they do something. So please be prepared for the possibility this was not a first-she seems to have it down, KWIM?

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-09-2000
Wed, 08-01-2007 - 5:17pm

Amelia...I am so stunned and shocked that she wasn't shopping with her friend. Since I don't have enough information yet, I can't imagine why she made up such a story and visited a town four hours away. I don't know who invited her or where she stayed or even who drove. Obviously her friend was in on the scheme, but I don't know if they made this trip together.

In the last year we have allowed her more independence. All I really ask is that she tell me ahead of time where she is going and who she'll be with. She has a curfew that is dependent on where she is going and she always had input to the time. I can't think of any time we have "forbidden" her to do something with her friends.

....I just had a brief conversation with her on the phone. I had left a voice mail message for her to call me. I asked when she was going to be home from work tonight. When she wanted to know why, I told her that we needed to have a little chat about how her weekend went. She asked me "how did I think her weekend went?" And I told her that I was sure that it didn't go exactly as she had lead me to believe". There was a lot of silence. She wanted to know what I knew about her weekend. Then I told her we would discuss it when she gets home.

She absolutely should be afraid about being punished. I have to make the punishment fit the crime and the punishment for continuing the lie will be more severe. I just don't know what it should be yet or how I should handle this conversation.

Julie

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-09-2000
Wed, 08-01-2007 - 5:35pm

I like that. I can use that sentence and she will not know what other details I have. It would not be good for her to make up more crap.

I think I will also tell her ahead of time what the punishment will be for the lies she has already told. So she has a starting place and will know what I tack on if the lies continue.

...then there's my husband. He will freak.

I don't think it's gonna be a good night. :(

Julie

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-21-2007
Wed, 08-01-2007 - 7:18pm

Julie,

Before I would go into my Lord High Executioner act, I would let her tell her story. Especially if you don't let on just how much you actually know and sound like you know it all and ask for her version, you might just get an entirely different deal than you were expecting. When I was an Air Force officer, I has a Master Sgt. that ran my office who had a technique for knowing exactly what went on when he wasn't there. He would put a very low ranking Sgt. who was afraid of both his shadow and being demoted again, in charge. When he got back to the office he would ask in an indignantly knowing voice, "Sgt. just what in the hell is going on here?" The reply he would get would be a list of excuses for everything that went wrong all day, none of which he would have ever known about without the confession.

Sorry for the digression, but I think it illustrates the principle. After you hear her story, would be the time to decide on a punishment, if any. The biggest complaint of older teens is that they do not think parents listen to them. By letting her tell her story without any prejudgment from you, regardless of what you do, she will feel like you have heard her and be more willing to go along with your program.

One last suggestion, if she has been the model kid that you say she has been, as is doing all those responsible things, like working and such, then maybe you might let her suggest what ought to be the consequence of her adventure, if it looks like there ought to be one. If she suggests something, it will probably be more severe than what you could dream up and there is more chance of it having the desired effect.

Jason Wittman

My website: http://TheParentsCoach.com
My parents blog: http://blog.TheParentsCoach.com       &nbs

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-19-2003
Wed, 08-01-2007 - 10:24pm
Please let us know how it goes...but I'm just curious. How did you find out she went somewhere else? Did someone see her?
iVillage Member
Registered: 11-28-1999
Thu, 08-02-2007 - 10:45am

...then there's my husband. He will freak.

Maybe that's the reason that DD didn't tell you where she was really going. My DSD (17) has been at her friend's house since Sat. night (snuck out of the house) and she insists that she is never coming home because her DF always yells at her whenever she does something wrong. This time, I didn't think that what she did was that bad, but it's an accumulation of a lot of sneaky things that she has been doing. So she lies about stuff all the time so as not to get caught. Your DD sounds a lot better and more responsible than my DSD though.

I also have an 18 yo DD. Most of the time, she tells me where she is going & with whom because I give her a lot of freedom. She is responsible and since she's going away to college anyway, where I wont' be able to supervise her, I don't see the sense of trying to manage her life that much until then. The one time she did lie to me (and she told me later, I didn't find out from someone else) is that one night she went to an under-21 dance club in Providence, RI (we live near Boston). She said she didn't tell me first because she thought I wouldn't let her go. Now I probably wouldn't have said no anyway. Since my friend's kids go there, I probably would have check it out w/ her to see what goes on and if it's safe. My DD also told my 76 yr old aunt (who lives in Prov) about it and she said she has actually gone twice. The first time she went just w/ girls and she found that it was more of a tough kind of place than she thought, so the next time, they took some boys w/ them. Now DD doesn't really know Prov, even though my family lives there--basically the only place she knows besides grandma's house is the mall. So my aunt told her that the area that club is in is really not the nicest area to be in at night.

The reason I told this very long story is that I think that what you should emphasize to your DD is that when she goes somewhere and doesn't tell you, there are all kinds of safety things to think about. If she didn't come home, you would have no idea where she was. You would be calling the police to say she went to the mall, when in fact she was in another town. Then you should find out how she even met these people and if she was w/ people she didn't know and met through the internet or something like that, how dangerous that is. I am always telling my kids about the stories I hear in the news about kids who meet people on the internet, then meet them in person and they turn out to be criminals.

I just remember a couple of things I did when I was a teenager that now when I look back at, could have really been dangerous, like going off w/ guys I met in a club. Luckily for me, everything turned out ok, and they were nice people, but kids are just so naive and never believe anything bad could happen.

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-09-2000
Thu, 08-02-2007 - 12:45pm

Thank you for your thoughtful and very reasonable replies. This is what has happened....

DD came home between her jobs last night to talk to me about this. She didn't want to wait until she came home at 10:30. I started out by telling her that I knew she did not go shopping and I knew she didn't stay over night at her friends house. I also told her I knew she was in the different town. Also to her relief, I told her that I would not share this information with her father if I believed what whe was telling me. (This is not typical, but I think in this case, it helped me get to the truth). Then, I let her tell her story.

So...there was never a plan to go shopping. She went to this other town with her friend (the one she was going shopping with), to visit some boy the friend met on facebook. They both lied to go because they didn't think we would let them if they told the truth. They spent the afternoon with this boy (college student) and then met his friends at a park. They (the three of them) went back to his apt and watched a movie and the girls spent the night. She claims, that she slept with her friend in the boy's bed and he slept on the sofa in this one-room apt. She said the visit was innocent and they didn't drink or do drugs or have any kind of relations with this boy or his friends.

Also, she told me that this boy had contacted her since and wanted to meet her this week in our town for dinner. He did not want her to invite her friend or even let the friend know about this "date". DD found this as odd as I did, and was genuinely relieved when I told her she would not be meeting this boy.

I believe what she told me. But I tried my best to explain to her just how dangerous this visit was. They didn't know this boy (although her friend has snuck out of town to meet him before), they didn't know the friends, they didn't know what his intentions were. While they were sleeping he could have done just about anything. Only three weeks ago we had a local college girl murdered because she trusted someone she didn't know. I told her how important it was to let someone know where she was. If something happened, and she didn't come home, we would have sent the police to the wrong place. I think I got my point across.

This is where we left it...I asked DD for her friend's home phone number (oh yea...DD knew what was coming next). DD asked if she could talk to her friend before I call her mother. Yes, in fact I said that it would be in her friend's very best interest to confess to her mother before I called. I also let DD know that if I didn't get a phone number, her and I would visit her friend's house in person tonight.

I don't think I am going to punish her in any other way. I think the real punishment was her telling me the story and hearing/seeing my reaction. Not to mention that her friend will also have to do the same thing.

How did I find out? I pay attention to facebook and myspace. DD had a new friend who seemed very out of place. I did a little investigating and bits of information suggested that DD was not where she said she was. Amazingly some of these kids will put anything out there. I guess they think their parents are too stupid to use the internet. DD knows better, but not all of her friends do. I think it is interesting that she didn't ask how I knew.

Thank you again for all your advice and support. I am so glad I have a place to come when I don't know what to do.

Julie

iVillage Member
Registered: 12-20-2005
Thu, 08-02-2007 - 12:54pm

<>

You are so very right - they don't hide anything...

A couple years ago, my DS (then 16) asked to go to a party - the rule at the time was that he could not go to a party if there would be no parents. He "scammed" me by having a friend I didn't know call me, pretending to be the young man's mother, and telling me she'd be home, she'd keep an eye on them, blah blah blah.

My son's friends all like to be "nice" to me - and at times, they have all been on my AIM buddy list. Said young man put as his away message the next morning something along the lines of "someone help me get this place cleaned up before parents come home!" (a very stupid thing to do). DS had not gotten home until 7 am - I woke his sorry butt up at 8 and spend the day reaming him - AND his boyfriend - AND his friend (both of whom had known about the lie and LOOKED ME IN THE FACE and backed it up).

Was that all I did? Pretty much - except for the next few months, I stalked unmercifully. My son never knew when I would "show up" wherever he was supposed to be. It was the consequence for the loss of my trust.

One of the rules I live by is that, if you're staying at X's house, you call me from X's LAND LINE - bc cell phones can be anywhere (most parents still have landlines), or I talk to X's mother - and if I've never meet X's mother (as was the case in this scenario), then I TAKE you to X's house - and meet X's mother face to face.

My older son used to joke that he knew he couldn't go to a party before he was invited - thanks to his stupid friends on myspace.

iVillage Member
Registered: 02-14-2000
Thu, 08-02-2007 - 1:21pm
Thank goodness your dd and her friend are safe, Julie.
Pam

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