Like Mother, Like…

(sigh) R hasn’t been home 12 hours, and he’s already telling bald-faced, stupid, yes-he’ll-definitely-get-caught lies. Why does he do that? It wasn’t even about a big thing, but it wasn’t anything he could in any way be “mistaken” about. He just chose to lie. I hate that.

I shouldn’t be surprised or disappointed. They are always much more poorly behaved after a visit with their mother—and the longer the visit was, the longer the adjustment period will be. But I’d really hoped to get through at least 24 hours without any problems worthy of mention.

R & G are disappointingly dishonest far too often. They lie casually, frequently, and without remorse. I’ve yet to figure out why—because they didn’t get enough immediate negative consequences for lying earlier in their lives? Because they’re modeling their behavior after their biomother? Their father thinks it’s protective behavior developed in an attempt to protect themselves from their mother’s rages, but I can’t see that in circumstances where it would be far easier to simply tell the truth.

Dishonesty is a big deal to me. I don’t trust anyone who is habitually dishonest (or is even dishonest ONCE about anything important). So there are two people in this house in whom I honestly have no trust at all. It isn’t a comfortable way to live. Yeah, they are just kids—but I can’t fully relax when there are untrustworthy people around. Maybe it’s the PTSD, and maybe it’s just having good sense.

I think sambear lived for so long with a habitual liar that it just doesn’t affect him as much. I don’t think he expects or demands honestly nearly as much as he should.

So here we go again. Back to the continual struggle1Yes, I know many parents see the continual struggle as normal. But when you have 13- and 10-year-old kids who still cannot be trusted to do these things consistently without constant nagging, it isn’t normal. A 5-6-year-old is old enough to be dressing and taking care of personal hygiene without prompting, and R & G cannot or will not do that consistently yet. just to get R & G to do basic things like bathe, brush their teeth, and take care of their pets and their own personal spaces. Much less help around here. And as school starts, we’ll be back to the constant struggle with G and the school work that she lies about, won’t do, etc. R cares about his grades – I don’t think G does. But R gets in trouble with academics at times due to procrastination and lack of self-discipline. Dammit.

Current Mood: 🙁depressed
Cyn is Rick's wife, Katie's Mom, and Esther & Oliver's Mémé. She's also a professional geek, avid reader, fledgling coder, enthusiastic gamer (TTRPGs), occasional singer, and devoted stitcher.
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