DP and 'little white lies'

[Delatron]

Been with DP for 7 years, have 2 young children together. On the whole we are very happy. He is kind, thoughtful and a wonderful father.

However, he has always been prone to telling white lies. Nothing serious, claiming to work late when he is actually going out for a drink is the most common one. Have busted him a few times and it is clear he just says what he thinks will cause the least hassle for him.

However, I am happy for him to go out for a few drinks after work, what I am furious about is that he feels he needs to lie. Have told him this and he agreed to stop.

I think he doesn't realise his iPhone is linked to our apple computer so shows all his messages. He changed our plans at the last minute tonight saying he had an urgent project to work on. It appears from his messages (yes I checked but was suspicious) that he has arranged to meet a former work colleague (girl), this is along with other colleagues so nothing untoward. He is driving too so I don't think he will be late.

So, he's not being unfaithful, he will probably be back at 9 but he has lied yet again! What do I do?

I totally agree with what athing said. You seem determined to justify his behaviour, so it's no wonder he feels like he can get away with it. I don't think anyone here was suggesting that this was evidence that he is cheating on you, just clear evidence that he is selfish and treats you with contempt. Only one poster has tried to help justify his actions and that is the poster that you latch onto.

I'm sorry if I sound harsh, and i hope you do manage to sort out your issues through counselling, but dont let him off the hook too easily.

Good luck.

He lies because he wants to please himself, because he does not respect you, because he does not want to be in a mature relationship and because he does not experience any consequences - hence the "not a big deal" comment.

I am taking this all on board. I didn't think the consensus would be strong.

I know it appears that I am making excuses for him but I think I am just trying to get my head around it all. The fact that these lies do negate all other positive character traits. I did think he was a good un!!

It's a lot to come to terms with in such a short time scale. Good luck

Ahh thanks chasedbybees, am very stressed about the whole thing and you have cheered me up. Verging on giving up on men and going to live in a little cottage by myself (with children!).

Is is a big thing.

Every lie erodes trust and respect.

Often this sort of habit is picked up from one's parents... I have a friend who does it and it drives me mad, but his mother (who is lovely) does just the same thing so he thinks it's fine. It's a sort of engrained cowardice and fear of confrontation, I think.

Agree with everyone else that you need to make the consequences for lying immediate and serious... then he may start realising it's a massive problem for you and take steps to change.

I think he fibs through guilt/trying to please everyone. He doesn't see it as the big deal it really is

He knows its a big deal because he knows how upset you get about being lied to and not about him going out.

As for fibbing through 'guilt'... what's there to feel guilty about if he'd been honest???

Delatron's DP: "I'm going on a quick do with the boys tonight as I haven't seen them all week and feel bad not going"

Delatron "Great, no problem, see you later"

Easy!! but no he's lied because he doesn't care and doesn't want to tell the truth.
My ex used to lie about everything ...its exhausting. And if found out, would just invent another 'semi plausible' lie like your DP did. Lying for me now would be a deal breaker.

If he knew he was going out later all along (which he did) then why not have said at the beginning "I've got a project on so won't be finishing till 7 then I'll be going out etc etc" x

Actually MooncupGoddess his mum does this. Have had times where she says one thing and he says another and I don't know who to believe. So maybe this is where he has learnt it is 'ok' from.

He needs to know this will threaten our relationship. Will have a serious chat tonight.

Exactly babyhammock. He called me at 3.30 to tell me he was working late (unheard of for me to get notice!) I asked then if he was going out for drinks (had seen texts) he said some people were but he wasn't. He should have said all along he was planning on going, even if just for 45 mins. He is so stupid!

My dp use to do this.

He would use the excuse that he didn't want to upset me, get grief .
So guess what, he got double grief, for doing something he knew i wouldn't be pleased about and for then lying about it.

It got to such a point, that i was a paranoid, snooping jealous person, and i couldn't be further from that person normally.

I was a mess. Ended up on anti depressants. I would question and analyse everything over and over and over. It was driving me insane. My anxiety levels went through the roof.

He would be annoyed with my snooping too. But i told him, you can't create a monster and then moan when it reacts. I explained that his lies where hurting me more than the truth ever would and that lying is the sign of an immature mind. Someone who is too immature to deal with the consequences of their behaviour. I also told him that he would be out on his ear if i had a sniff that he was lying again.

It helped a lot that i have detached. I don't snoop anymore. I also don't love him like i did. Which is sad.

He was in his 20's when this happened and he's in his 30's now - so i think some element of maturity did happen.

Lies are toxic to a relationship and they take away a persons choice. (i explained that too) If i'd have known about some of the stuff years ago, i would have had the choice to leave- lying stopped that choice. I now have 3 kids to consider, so it's more difficult. It has definatley soured the last 3 years, although we are a lot better now, then we probably have ever been. I just need to not judge him on his past-as he is not the same person, and has jumped through hoops since - but it's so hard.

Thanks for sharing your situation sassy. That is my biggest fear, that my feelings for him will go and I won't care anymore. Glad to hear things have improved though. Hopefully if I lay down the law now he will stop, we have had the conversation so many times though. It will need a serious threat to leave and I will have to carry it through.

Cronullshaw please don't make assumptions about the level of white lies and insinuate I am breaking in a new puppy. I am a laid back easy going person but after 4 years of it. and going through a range of emotions - upset, dishonesty, insecurity, disrespect I had had enough and was at the end of my tether. it was exhausting.

So, not that I have to prove anything to you, but here's a few choice examples of the "little white lies", and yes no-one was physically harmed, but my mental health went through the floor. The person I trusted with my life was someone I found I couldn't rely on.

So are you ready:

Told me he had an urgent army exercise - went on holiday with the army diving in Belize
Told me his army exercises were delayed by two weeks in Canada - went on a bender holiday with his troop mates.
I found a written receipt under the sofa, he insinuated it was for an engagment ring, it was actually for some diving equipment.
Told me a wedding of our friends was just blokes only when I was invited but he wanted a drink up with his mates.
He bought a motorbike and kept it at a friends house without telling me, then he told me he had borrowed it from a friend who was on exercise when I saw him riding it on Salisbury plain one afternoon.
I was using all my redundancy money to pay bills, and he was spending his money building a model car that I had told him we couldn't really afford. He kept it hidden in the shed.
We had a holiday with family booked in Blackpool, he had already said he would help out on a diving trip to Malta and didn't tell me until the day before we were supposed to leave. He said it was last minute and he was asked to help as someone dropped out and it was a great opportunity. Found out that he had been booked on it for months.
Every Wednesday he used to go diving in Dorset when I though he was working, until someone told me it was "sports day" in the army. I found out after 6 months.

All through this childish behaviour I managed as an army wife, with a professional career and a young DS.

The final night he did it again - we were meant to go to Brighton to stay with dear friends. They had gone to a lot of trouble and were so excited to see us. He called at 4pm on the Friday to say he had to work over the weekend. I said I was going anyway and was leaving after school pick up. I went home to find him packing his dive gear into a friends car. I went on my weekend, came back and locked the doors.

In the end, after much counselling and me drawing the line, we got through it. He understood the cycle of dishonesty was making things worse than they needed to be. I think looking at that fairly small excerpt I actually had pretty good grounds for divorce. But I forgave him.

But I guess in your head I should have just put up with it, "understood" him and given him a cuddle, yeah?

wally I wouldn't say your consequences were controlling. after reading all that, i would say they were rather mild!

Jeez, he makes mine look good.

Thanks Sassy that previously condescending comment really boiled my piss.

People post tough advice on here because they've been in tough situations.

It may be harmless goodwilled banter to some people but it always leads you to wonder about the big things in life they could be lying about. You can't help but form a thread in your head and it is just soul destroying.

If someone can look you in the eye and lie about a night out, what's to stop them from saying "no, I haven't defaulted on the mortgage"

To me there are more things to worry about than affairs...there is finance, the house, his job...who knows.

And the key thing? I had never ever stopped him from having a social life. I was the one that helped him get into the dive club ffs!

Wally, I hope your husband understands how lucky he is that you are still around

You're a better woman than me, Wally. I found XH's lying to be so exhausting that I divorced him, in the end.

Of course there were other factors too, but it got the point where he would lie about anything, and I just couldn't trust him anymore.

So rather than wonder if he'd (e.g) gone clubbing after work instead of having missed the bus, or spent that £200 on himself/an OW instead of paying the overdue bill, I decided that life would be better on my own. At least I never lied to myself!

It's like building a house on shifting sands, I think- what appears to be stable and solid turns out to be nothing but fantasy and air.

wally Forgot to say mine was navy for 11 years- wondering if it's armed forces related?! They do tend to be; mates, me, me, me orientated.

I totally identify with the words insecure and soul destroying too.

Thanks to mn though, i am a lot more;

bolshy,
who the fuck do you think you are,
i'm not putting up with this shit,
you are punching above your weight as it is etc.

Thanks mumsnet.

Sassy I think it might be, a lot of them are very selfish.

Some of the squaddies used to wind each other up to ridiculous levels about having nagging wives, being under the thumb etc, when they themselves were just sad lonely misogynistic pr*cks stuck in a block in a single bed all weekend.

I used to hate that joke "how do you know when a man is lying - his mouth is moving" but sadly for some women it's too bloody true.

Yes my husband is well aware of what he nearly lost. Sadly I have lost a massive chunk of respect and honour for him and I doubt I will get that back. It's taken two years to finally trust him, and then it will never be 100%.

So, OP, do you want to be me in two years time? Really?

I really feel for you op!! My exDh was a liar, (one of his better qualities!!!) and I first found out a week before our wedding. My gut told me to run but he schmoozed me into years of madness believing it was a one off aberration. We had 2 dcs and I felt worse and worse. He was a financial adviser and desperate to impress/please colleagues. He would often choose after work drinks over coming home e.g. when I had a temperature of 104 had passed out and rung him in tears to say I wasn't safe to bath and put kids to bed. I ended up with clinical anxiety and on ads and doubting myself. I finally got strong enough to leave him and haven't looked back. My lovely dh is actually a self aware kind honest guy and I can't believe I put up with bullshit for so long and lost myself in the process! Afterwards he said that he "only lied about stuff that didn't matter" and that "everyone lies". Erm......no they don't. I think you're worth more than this! Good luck x

Just a thought Delatron my lovely DP told me she used to be a liar when she was younger (in her teens and 20s). She said she used to embelish stories, she didn't really know why. She doesn't do that at all now, I have never had any reason to doubt her in our 10 years together. Maybe you need to make it really clear what a deal breaking situation this is so that he works through his reasons for doing it and finds a way to stop. If he has been doing it since he was a child it is a pattern of behaviour he has formed that needs to be unlearned.

All your stories are making me realise how out of hand this can get and the small, seemingly innocuous lies can lead on to the bigger lies. About fundamental, really important stuff. So thanks for sharing.

At the moment (I think!) it really has just been lies about going out for a drink when he has claimed to be working late. But yes, that is all I am AWARE of. Of course if he lies about little things then he could be lying about other stuff too.

He always downplays the lying. I am guilty of not coming down harder on him, though last time I really thought I had. Clearly not.

Cherries I do think he has always done this, not big stuff but just little lies about timings etc, he does it to his parents, his friends, have listened to him do it so he really doesn't see it as a big deal. I, however, can't abide lying, always tell the truth and have had this instilled in to me since childhood. Think a long chat is in order and some very tough rules laid down.

Fragglewump, sorry to hear you had such a tough time with your ex. The 'only lying about stuff that doesn't matter' really resonates with me, this is what DP says....

Really pleased you have found someone honest and kind. Shows there are some honest men out there..

But you have had this talk several times before.

What will be different this time?

dela my previous user name was Liarswife .. My stbxh never went anywhere and still managed to have an affair ( half days, lunchtimes and fake training and conferences)

I saw him tell 'white lies' on many occasions .. We went for counselling as I suspected that he was having an affair .. He lied there too I'm afraid