Name: Spreading the Feast Gathering
Start: 2025-07-11T00:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-07-12T23:59:59-05:00
Location: LaGrange, KY

Tagged: Consequences for lying, correcting lying, Lying

This topic has 10 replies, 7 voices, and was last updated 9 years, 11 months ago by junkybird.

Viewing 11 posts - 1 through 11 (of 11 total)

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July 7, 2015 at 10:53 am
junkybird
Participant
What do you do when both kids say that they are not lying?
My DS11 and DD7 are constantly getting into trouble for lying. It disrupts the entire day. What I do right now for consequences is give them BOTH chores. I simply do not know which one is lying and I just don’t know what else to do. For the past several years our son has had both my husband and I convinced that it was our daughter doing it all. He made it believable. She always seemed so sneaky. In the past several months, we have come to realize that it was not her. It was him! And all that time she was getting punished for things that she did not do or say, etc.
Here is an example of the way things are going. This morning, my daughter accused my son of “punching her in the stomach.” He says he did not do it. No one will tell the truth. They eat, do their individual work/seat work and then I make a tally of chores for them to do. Right now my son is up to 13 and my daughter is at 18. More chores are added for ugliness and any other bad behavior.
Basically, my house is getting cleaned, by them, around once a week. By mid-afternoon, whoever did whatever it was, usually confesses because they are sick of doing chores.
Please! Help me. What do I do for this problem? I am just sick of this!
July 7, 2015 at 12:18 pm
suzukimom
Participant
Following because of similar problems with 4 kids….
July 7, 2015 at 12:44 pm
Tristan
Participant
I tried typing a response, I’ll keep it short and try again. You won’t like my answer but know that it is given in love.
Treat them like 2 year olds. They now stay with you all the time. When you leave the room they come with you. They are not free to play out of your sight, do school work out of your sight, etc. This is the only way you can begin to address the issues of lying and deception (and hurting each other that you mentioned). Why? Because you have to be where you can see what is going on and hear what is being said.
Yes, it is drastic. But picture the same behavior when they are 14 or 16. The stakes are so much higher when they have a habit of lying and deception and now are lying about things like where they are going, who they’ll be with, and what they’ll be doing.
It’s not a quick fix, and if someone says there is one they’re wrong. You will likely need to consistently do this for 3-4 months, possibly a year. BUT addressing it now when it is small stakes and they are younger is worth the effort and trouble it will feel like to do it.
((HUGS))
July 7, 2015 at 1:02 pm
missceegee
Participant
Echoing Tristan exactly. It works.
July 7, 2015 at 10:38 pm
Marie Barck
Participant
Wow, that is good and definitely hard advice! I am going to try this as I am at my wit’s end with some similar issues. The stress of having them constantly underfoot cannot be much more than the stress of constantly dealing with bad habits and possible future consequences. Pray for me! I know this won’t be easy.
Is any of this in Laying Down the Rails?
How do you determine when they are ready to be unsupervised?
Have any of you tried this personally?
July 8, 2015 at 5:25 am
Melanie32
Participant
I agree with Tristan and Christy as well.
Years ago, when my kids were little, there was a popular website that called this approach tomato staking. I believe she wrote a book. I’m not endorsing either because I don’t remember much about it but this thread brought it to mind. You might google it and see what you think.
July 8, 2015 at 6:47 am
missceegee
Participant
Raising Godly Tomatoes is the website and the book title. I do not wish to start a debate about the ideas and methods within or of discipline in general. I will simply say that several ideas like tomato staking were useful to me.
July 8, 2015 at 7:11 am
missceegee
Participant
I used this idea with all of my kids when they were small. Now at 14, 11, 8, and 5.5, we don’t typically need to tomato stake. However, as Sonya sometimes says, a plate needs a little spin now and again to keep up a habit. If I see one of the kids (the 8 or 5 year old) behaving in any unacceptable manner, we revisit tomato staking for a day or two. Because they’ve been trained this way, that is all it takes.
I’ll give you a real life example from last week. We have 3 doors and frames in the hallway that paint doesn’t like to stick to. We really should sand it down to wood and start over, but I digress. Last week I walked into the hallway and found peeled paint on the floor. This happened twice before in previous years. Knowing that the two oldest were not to blame for this, I called ds5 and dd8 to the hall and asked them about it. Both said they weren’t responsible and this is likely because they remembered that they were told not to do this last year and were disciplined for it. Seeing as the paint didn’t jump off the door, knowing one of the two had done it, I had both stand and look at the mess while hubby and I returned to the attic clean up we were in the middle of. In less than five minutes, they came together and admitted that they were both responsible for the damage and mess and apologized for it and for lying. We accepted their apology and sent them to clean up the mess by hand and to perform extra chores since they couldn’t repair what was damaged. We reminded them that we never damage property intentionally or absentmindedly and that such damages require daddy to spend his free time making repairs instead of just hanging out with us. Now, this incident probably would have been long and drawn out without the earlier training, but thanks to the training, it was just an errant blip on a day. Most of the time, the great majority of the time, the kids all own up to their mistakes or even sin, but they are human like us and sometimes get afraid. Ds5 and dd8 feared the wrong thing – the discipline that must come – instead of the consequences of destructive behavior and dishonesty to one’s heart. They learned, once again, that the consequences for their behavior were a minor thing, but dealing rightly with the issue was a major thing for their hearts. As I type this, The Story of Ping comes to mind as a living example of behavior.
Keep the faith.
Christie
July 8, 2015 at 9:47 am
Tristan
Participant
You probably won’t like my answer, just warning you!
Because what you are doing is not working you need to do something different. My suggestion is to treat them like 2 year olds – keep them in your sight at all times. Period. If you need to go to a different room they must go with you. They are not free to play or work anywhere you are not at because they cannot be trusted. Hurting others and lying about it, and a child who has lied for months and gotten away with it, are not going to fix themselves with some quick, easy consequence. You can see that. Which means that the sooner you get drastic the sooner you can hope things begin to change. It also means that you can’t have a few good days or even a good week and then let them go back to freedom and right into their old, lying and hurting each other ways. I would guess that at minimum you’ll need to keep them with you at all times for a few months.
Why keep them with you? Because YOU need to see and hear everything that is happening, what they are doing, what they are saying, etc. Just like a toddler, you need to oversee their behavior and give corrections right away. They will have no opportunity for lying because you are with them and paying attention to what is going on.
Yes. I told you that you probably wouldn’t like my advice! LOL However, I say it in love, this is something that will only get worse if left as things are. A drastic few months now, or even a year of drastic, is better than children who grow into teens that are still lying and suddenly have a whole new world of bigger things to lie about. Yes, it is frustrating to have them lie now. But I shudder when I think of the things a teen who is in the habit of deception can lie about (where they are going, who they are with, what they are doing, the list goes on and on).
((HUGS)) Being the mom is hard! Praying for you!
July 8, 2015 at 9:48 am
MountainMamma
Participant
I agree with Tristan. My children are young so I don’t have any advice or wisdom, but I can say that my own parents did not train that habit out of me and I suffered greatly for it when I left home in my late teens. By that point it was a full-blown habit and it took years (and some painful broken relationships and consequences) to break. I agree that you should “tomato stake” them as long as it takes to break the habit of untruthfulness. The consequences are far, far worse later when they are older.
July 8, 2015 at 2:47 pm
junkybird
Participant
Thanks ladies for all your responses! I am going to try it 🙂 Prayers appreciated!
Jenn