Dealing with compulsive lying

@Bridgetjones. You say your daughter has shown signs of a MI. But has she ever been diagnosed? If not, I think it might be the first step.
An appointment with a good psychiatrist who may be able to diagnose her & then if she is MI, then get her the therapy she needs.
I think the earlier therapy / treatment is offered - the more successful the outcome.

Hello @Bridgetjones,

That sounds like it would be hard to deal with your daughters compulsive lying, have you managed to talk to her about why she continues to lie and how she feels when she is lying, it must be making her feel uncomfortable or even possibly worried all the time to not feel like she can be herself. It might be helpful for her to talk to a counsellor or psychologist about her reasons for why she feels like she can't tell the truth.

I had a close friend who was a compulsive lier and it was something that she had learnt to do to gain acceptance from friends at school as she was bullied and often critised from people in her life, she coped by lying but over time it got her in more trouble with those people, she managed to seek help and gained confidence to be honest and open with herself.

Maybe just try to not focus on the lies but the thought and feelings behind the lies to get the real truth of this behaviour?

Take care of yourself too, that is very important as a carer of someone with a mental illness.

Lunar

Hi @Bridgetjones. Perhaps your daughter believes her present life is 'boring' compared to other friends she may have. People who habitually lie about their lives or jobs often feel they need to re-invent their lives to 'keep up' with their mates. They start believing in their stories and will react, often violently, when caught out or challenged. As Teej pointed out some of it comes back to a lack of self esteem, some of it relates to jealousy if a sibling appears to be 'better' than them. If you do confront her, be prepared for anger, resentment. I don't think she is 'ill' as such, I think she possibly just feels inferior to her mates and needs to be on a par. Trying to 'challenge' her by correcting her will only cause more friction as she will resent the challenge. It's possible most of her mates accept she is telling stories and totally ignore her, may even laugh behind her. There is no easy, right or wrong answer to this, sometimes the best course of action is acceptance and changing the subject. I wouldn't trust her because you know she is not trustworthy, but this shouldn't change how you treat her overall. You will know when she is being truthful and when to doubt her. She is your daughter, you know her better than she knows herself. When she says something you know is not true, simply change the subject and ignore the story. The more you react, the more uptight and angry you become. By ignoring, changing the subject, she realizes you are not fazed and eventually she will realize her stories are being ignored. Some of the stories obviously hurt, this is purely for reaction, the more outrageous, scandalous, the better the notice. I know it's hard, it hurts, but be aware her attempts to hurt and confuse are for reaction.

Thanks to all who replied to my post. My daughter is seeing a psychologist and is on meds for depression. Doubt her tendency to lie and make up stories would have been brought up by her. Majority of her tales seem to be about taking drugs. She seems to see it as being cool to have tried drugs. She knows Im anti drugs so maybe she says shes used drugs to get to me. Another lies have been more serious (wont go into details as may be triggering for some) led to police involvement and the police considering charging her with wasting police time.
As a result of all that Im numb to everything bad that she brings up. To the point that I ask for proof of everything, that leds her to get annoyed because I dont trust her... Drives me crazy the endless doubting and her inability to see the consequences her lying has caused. The damage it has caused to our relationship and how I view her

Hi @Bridgetjones. I can so relate to your anxiety over your daughter's drug use. I've recently had to deal with a similar problem with my daughter. My daughter is at present in a MHU after a concoction of drugs and alcohol. She too is seeing a psych to try to sort out why she has done what she did. In her case too the police have been called in, this led to her literally breaking down and asking for help. With my daughter, most of her trouble seems to stem from her father's suicide, and her inability to understand or accept his death. She was starting to lie and she tried to sabotage my relationship with a chap I liked. That relationship has since ended, not through my daughter, through him. It could be with your daughter, she doesn't want to see the damage she's doing. To have to face up to what she's doing and saying could be quite difficult and not what she wants to do - yet. When someone builds their life around a lie, they tend to start believing that lie. Rather than admit it is a lie, they will counter the original lie with a fresh one, then counter that and so on. For her to admit she's telling lie after lie, means she has to face herself and that means asking for help. Till she's ready to admit she needs help, all you can do is tell her, talk to me when you can 'face' yourself. I wouldn't waste time asking for proof of this, proof of that, I would simply say, I don't have time with your games. Be honest, or be silent. Does she look you directly in the eye? If she does, does she 'blink' rapidly, is there a telltale sign of the lies? My daughter would look over my shoulder, out the window, at the floor. Even if she looked directly at me, I just 'knew'. Even when I doubted, I would pretend to go along, but at the 'crunch time', I would ignore and stick to my original plans. Calling her bluff won't work, the only thing that seems to work is totally ignore if you suspect she's lying. No matter how outrageous - ignore. If she gets in trouble with the police, let her know it's her fault. Tell her you are there, but she needs to face the consequences of her actions. Tough love - extremely tough love.