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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Dealing with lying relative

24 replies

ScarlettSunset · 10/12/2022 08:16

Does anyone else have to deal with people who tell lies constantly? I have a family member who just seems to tell lie after lie. I have known this person all my life and they frequently tell stories where they were an amazing hero, or when something awful happened and they were the victim of a terrible incident etc. Even though they know I know they are lying and it's easily provable. I used to call them out but they'd just insist I was wrong, so mostly these days I try to avoid them.
Some of the lies don't bother me, but just lately they seem to be including
me in them and I've had other family
members who don't know them so well, contacting me to tell me how horrible I am, because they have been painting me out to be a villain of some sort in situations I'm not even aware of (because they have made them up entirely in their head). To be fair, I'm not close to those other family members and if they choose to believe the lies then that's on them, but it doesn't stop it being annoying and hurtful that it happens.

OP posts:

Thingamebobwotsit · 10/12/2022 08:23

Yep. My Mum. All you can do is take the moral higher ground and avoid them. Have tried everything over the years and came to the conclusion the issue was she actually believes her stories and hasn't got the emotional maturity to accept when she is wrong.

Best thing for it is ignore and move on. I tend to grey rock it or close it down by changing subject. But it does mean I see very little of her (virtually NC and was NC for a while). If they don't know what is going on in your life they can't tell stories about it is my experience.

Am very sorry that you are also going through this. Sad and difficult I know, but am guessing if you are posting about it on a forum it is bad enough to be frustrating and potentially upsetting. I promise you it isn't you at fault here.

Original poster

ScarlettSunset · 10/12/2022 08:31

Thank you. Im sorry you've gone through it with your mum. As in your case, I do think they actually believe the lies they tell.
I am trying to keep as low contact as I can.

OP posts:

TiaraBoo · 10/12/2022 08:47

It’s one thing telling lies about yourself but to tell lies about you, I wouldn’t be having that!

AFS1 · 10/12/2022 09:00

Yes - my sister-in-law. She always bases her lies on an element of truth, so it’s harder to call her out on them, but she’s told lies about me to me “do you remember when you did this”. I just say “no, I don’t remember that at all.”

But the thing I hate is how the rest of the family get caught up in her lies. She had a “cancer scare” recently that was patently untrue. The worry she put my parents through was cruel.

Original poster

ScarlettSunset · 10/12/2022 09:10

A cancer scare lie is just so awful. And I'd imagine it's the sort of thing that would make you look cruel and uncaring if you said anything.

OP posts:

Maray1967 · 10/12/2022 10:13

Push back hard and then ignore. Just tell them that she’s talking nonsense. If they choose to believe it, you can’t change their minds but you can change how it makes you feel.

Scottishskifun · 10/12/2022 10:18

Yes my MIL and she then plays the sob act. But entertainingly she forgets which lie she's told to which child so we now deliberately see her with my SIL and then she keeps quiet rather then get caught up in her own lies which makes for a peaceful visit!

We just ignore it the majority of time. Occasionally my DH aunt asks us about something and we will explain that's not the case to which his Aunt says ah I see and then usually says I will have a word....
MIL loves to play the victim in everything thankfully her children don't rise to any of it!

MeMyCatsAndMyBooks · 10/12/2022 10:19

Yes my SIL. Had to go no contact in the end as most of the extended family believed her.

More fool them I say. She ended up on my doorstep in tears last year wanting to apologise, we didn't answer the door.

StickyCricket · 10/12/2022 10:25

Yes my SIL does this. It’s like she lives in some alternate reality.

It really came to a head last year when there was a family gathering at which she verbally attacked a family member completely unprovoked, and by the next day she had reimagined the whole scene with herself as the victim. It was quite astonishing.

We avoid her as much as possible now, at family gatherings we sit as far away as possible from her, we have no contact over text/phone, she will never set foot in our home again, and we certainly would never put ourselves in the position of being alone with her.

IncompleteSenten · 10/12/2022 10:25

I think a calm "that didn't happen, you must be mixing me up with someone else" is a good one to start with.

It's not good to let lies go unchallenged. It makes you feel like shit and it's difficult to deal with the sense of unfairness.

When I was about 18 I was in a pub with some friends and some blokes we'd just met and one of my friends decides to regale the table with the tale of the time I got into a fight at school, pushed a kid down a flight of stairs and broke their arm.

Never happened. As far as I am aware never happened to anyone at the school! So it wasn't a case of mistaken identity. Just a flat out lie.

Unfortunately, I was a spineless doormat at the time so I just sank into my pint and nodded along. I didn't want to embarrass her by saying she was a liar.

Original poster

ScarlettSunset · 10/12/2022 11:01

Thanks everyone.
I think I will try to calmly set people straight if they contact me. I fully expect that they will think I'm the one lying but at least I'll have a tried.

I really feel for everyone else who has to put up with this too.

OP posts:

Blanca87 · 10/12/2022 11:10

I have someone close to me who does this. Call them out every single time as it’s dreadful role modelling for starters. I just don’t understand this behaviour it’s batshit at best, psychopathic at worst.

KangarooKenny · 10/12/2022 11:11

My FIL told 2 lies about me, that I know of, so I told the in-laws that it was anout right lie and went NC with him.
Unfortunately my DH is also a fibber, he does it to get him out of situations and desks with the consequences if he is found out. I constantly call him out now, and have massive resentment due to it.

Sprouttreesareamazing · 10/12/2022 11:13

A very close relative was a liar... I stepped away from the relationship.. After they ruined Christmas 3 years ago we have been nc.
Sad but my mh improved massively..

AFS1 · 10/12/2022 12:05

ScarlettSunset · 10/12/2022 09:10

A cancer scare lie is just so awful. And I'd imagine it's the sort of thing that would make you look cruel and uncaring if you said anything.

It was massively frustrating. There were so many holes in her story, but even though my family know she’s lied in the past, there was absolutely no way I could tell them that this was another fabrication. My partner and I just had to go along with it. It all felt completely disingenuous on all sides.

KettrickenSmiled · 10/12/2022 12:22

ScarlettSunset · 10/12/2022 11:01

Thanks everyone.
I think I will try to calmly set people straight if they contact me. I fully expect that they will think I'm the one lying but at least I'll have a tried.

I really feel for everyone else who has to put up with this too.

Good plan OP - & calm is the key here.

I've been there with a relative, & it's equal parts infuriating & worrying.
All you can say is "look, Relative has form for telling pointless lies, ask anyone. I have challenged them about lying in the past, so they're now punishing me by - you guessed it! - inventing lies about me. Sorry you had to hear whatever nonsense they spouted at you, but how are you doing? Are you going to Aunt Mabel's 80th" ..." etc

NippyWoowoo · 10/12/2022 13:13

Are we in the same family? 😂

As the person involved isn't a parent, I just nod and smile. When their children call it out it ends in screaming and stomping off. Years of doing it they're not going to change.

Looking forward to Christmas 😵‍💫

Latenightreader · 10/12/2022 14:30

I have an aunt who does this. Mainly silly lies, like she gave my grandad a kettle, and when it turned out to be useless, told her other sister that my mum had bought it. She is so desperate to be liked.

Sprouttreesareamazing · 10/12/2022 14:40

My relative claimed to have had cancer surgery one week. Rough and tumbling on the floor with my toddler dc I took a photo to remind myself they were a liar.

Laiste · 10/12/2022 14:55

My Mother.
She's told fibs to manipulate people all her life. I remember when i was growing up her actually encouraging me to do the same!

Now she's elderly and the layers of lies she tells become so ingrained that i don't think she considers for a moment actually telling the truth if there's something more entertaining to say. Her life has shrunk now (as it often does when people become elderly) and she just tells people things which she makes up on the spot. I hear her on the phone (she lives with us) telling other people about things i've apparently said or done that day or the day before which i never said. Stupid stuff. Nothing majorly important. But why lie?!

She's got all her marbles by the way. Sharp as a tack.

She'll even try to lie about the weather. If i've been out for the day or away with DH for a few days we'll come home and she'll tell me it's been torrential rain or baking sun - and i'll speak to someone else and it'll turn out to be total lies

That weather one - she's stopped doing it since some of the kids are adults and stay behind when we go away. ie: her lies would be obvious.

ColdHandsHotHead · 10/12/2022 15:04

I had someone in my life for a short time recently who was like this. It got to the point where I believed nothing they said. I accepted that it might be true, but I couldn't rely on what they said. Silly things that didn't matter, and quite often things that were easily disprovable. Eg 'I was asleep, I didn't get your text' when I could see that the text had been read and at what time. They would insist that their lie was the truth even when it was obvious it wasn't. If shown evidence that they were lying, they'd sulk. It was pointless and maddening. I no longer have any contact with this person and it's such a relief!

cheninblanc · 10/12/2022 15:20

Yes, a young adult that I can't not be around (although can keep my distance) had lied since I've known her. A few lies have had some consequences that could have been life changing for the people involved. Caught lying this morning even, there's no getting away from it and it damages relationships with them and with others, at times I've felt i was going mad with it, its soul destroying. I keep a big distance and never ever allow myself to be alone with her. Ever.

PeaceJoySleep · 10/12/2022 15:22

I know somebody like this. Heaven help you that this is a relative. :-(

Beanagirl · 18/01/2025 08:36

i was reading the posts about a lying relative
I have encountered this experience and i still find it traumatic.
my dad had passed away in 2022 and my mum sister and niece visited my daughter without me knowing and I was left at my sisters house alone and I saw on my WhatsApp a pic of my mum at my daughters so I rang my niece and she said she was at her mums partners house then I confronted my mum and my sister and she said it was because I had moaned about her being given money by late father to purchase a car .
which was not the case my daughter was in on this and said that I did say this.
i was totally shocked by what they had done to me.
i feel like the same thing is happening again as they are acting all secretive again
it’s my grand daughters birthday today and my mum said she is popping over to see her but has said before she don’t like driving over there by herself.
i don’t know what to do.

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