Eps 540: Building trust without shame when our teens lie
Episode 540Happy New Year! I’m embracing the energy of being a deliberate creator, focusing on growth and learning. A listener shared a challenge about their 13-year-old son lying about screen time. While the lie was minor, the parents were troubled by how easily it was told. I encouraged them to approach this with curiosity and love, not punishment. Share disappointment without shaming, revisit agreements, and emphasize that mistakes are opportunities to learn. Trust and honesty grow through connection and communication, not fear or control. Parenting is messy, but every challenge is a chance to grow together.
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Takeaways from the show
- Embrace growth by staying present and curious.
- Mistakes are opportunities for learning and connection.
- Approach challenges with kindness, firmness, and trust.
- Teach honesty through relationships, not punishments.
- Celebrate positive connections despite adolescent missteps.
- Address lying with curiosity, not fear or anger.
- Align privileges with responsibilities to encourage accountability.
- Share disappointment without shaming; emphasize love.
- Support teens’ learning through compassionate conversations.
- Trust your parenting instincts—growth is a journey.
Today Joyful Courage means choosing to meet life with optimism and enthusiasm. Happy twenty twenty THRIVE. 🎉❤️
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Transcription
[00:00:00] Casey O'Roarty: [Music] Hi listeners, welcome back to the Joyful Courage podcast, a place for you to hopefully feel seen and heard as we talk about all the things that come with the season of parenting adolescence. Parenting teens is messy, no doubt, and when we remember that our kids are growing through what they're going through, and we are too.
[00:00:24] Things can start to feel okay. We can have faith and believe that everything will turn out okay. I am Casey O'Rourke. I'm your host. I am a positive discipline lead trainer, a parent coach, and the adolescent lead at Sproutable. I have two young adult kids of my own and have been in the trenches just like you.
[00:00:43] I love supporting families. I work one on one with parents all over the world. And I run a thriving membership program. Speaking of the Living Joyful Courage membership program, doors are now open for new members. And our first community call is January 15th. We currently hold about 40 people in the membership, many of which are in their second or third year.
[00:01:06] We do twice monthly group calls, quarterly one on one calls, office hours and have an active community forum. These are real parents moving through real challenges, showing up vulnerably and feeling the love and support from a like minded community. This is my very favorite way to support parents and I want you to check it out.
[00:01:25] Go to besproutable. com slash ljc Find out more. Again, that's bs spreadable.com/ljc. You can get more information and you can get enrolled today. The door only open to the public once a year, and we are waiting for you. Thank you for listening to my little promo. And now let's get on today's show.
[00:01:46] [Music] Hey, everybody, Happy New Year. Welcome back to the pod. First solo show of 2025. How's it going? Thank you for being here. Thanks for joining me. I am obsessed. I love New Year's energy. You're going to hear me say this often in the next couple weeks, maybe I've already said it. But I love New Year's energy. I want to live in the energy of believing that I am a deliberate creator of my life and I love this idea of reset, relaunch, redo.
[00:02:33] You know, it's just a day, but it's awesome. It's fun to have this fresh energy, especially after the craziness of the holiday season. And yeah, I want to live in the energy of believing that I get to create what I want, that I get to be deliberate. with drawing in, creating, animating what I want in my life.
[00:02:55] And what does this mean? It means that I have the power of interpreting my experiences. I get to decide the meaning of my experiences and I get to give them meaning that is useful and forward thinking. I am a total self improvement junkie. Yes, it's true. I have faith that everything is unfolding for me, that things happen for me, not to me.
[00:03:26] I really try to sit in that mindset. I appreciate the present moment for the gifts and opportunities that are offered, right? Kind of, with the unfolding, and Yeah, really working to come from the lens of love and possibility. So being a deliberate creator, this is kind of what I mean by that. And I'm bringing it into 2025, this new year, bringing it into the podcast and bringing it into the content that I'm creating for all of you.
[00:04:01] How are you all? How are you? So, This show goes live January 2nd, 2025. Hopefully you are enjoying these last few days for most of us here in the States. The last few days of winter break with our kiddos before they go back to the routine of school. I hope that you're ready to just kind of settle into what is real and alive for you right now.
[00:04:30] I am bringing in a question from the community for the podcast content this week. I haven't been super active in the Facebook group this month. December was a lot. It was, you know, 12 days of being completely out of town and off the grid. And then a week of prep for holiday. And then just a lot of catching up, but also prepping to be gone another week over this week, this actual week of New Year's.
[00:05:04] I'm out and about seeing music and seeing friends and celebrating one of my besties. 50th birthdays. Shout out to Nancy Jean. I love you and I can't wait to celebrate you on Saturday. So yeah, December was a wild month and January just feels really spacious and good. I get to start with my new members in the Living Joyful Courage membership program.
[00:05:35] So enrollment is open. I'm sure you heard that in the intro of this show. And the Living Joyful Courage membership program is open for you to join. It's my fave. It is totally my favorite. And I get so excited to welcome in new members as well as the people that choose to re enroll. Most people that come through the Living Joyful Courage membership program stay for two or three years, which is awesome.
[00:06:05] I love getting to know parents on that deeper level by working with them through the membership. So, Yeah, January. So I wasn't super active in the Facebook group in December and I was poking around looking for a good post to use for today's show and I found one. And I feel like this one is really good because one, it's a challenge that all parents of tweens and teens navigate.
[00:06:34] And it's a great, um, challenge to tease apart, look for the reframe, and maybe look at from a different lens. So, here's what the anonymous parent wrote. Our 13 year old son lied to us last night. I'm not going to be naive and say that it was the first time he's lied, but it was the first time it was so blatant and he did it so straight faced.
[00:07:01] I'll spare you the whole story, but suffice to say that the thing he lied about was pretty minor. He lied about playing more video games than was allowed. We made our expectations very clear concerning the game use, and he lied about it. We used, quote, trust, but verify, and discovered that he had lied. He had said he was playing with a friend when he was just playing alone.
[00:07:27] We didn't entrap him. We gave him several opportunities to rescind his story before corroborating his lie. When we confronted him with the lie, he said he didn't want us to be mad at him. This is a kid we generally have a very good relationship with. He is sweet and we talk often. So here's my question.
[00:07:46] What do we do now? Our biggest concern is the lie. The thing he lied about is really small, but the comfort with which he lied was concerning. We talk a lot about trust, and we have, I hope, established trust in our relationship around school. He asks us not to intervene, and we don't. But we want to establish that lying is not okay.
[00:08:07] Specifically, what are the consequences for lying? I know we need to look at his motivation for lying, which is that he didn't want us to be mad or disappointed, but we are disappointed. Is that fair to communicate without shaming him? I really struggle sometimes with positive discipline on how to react in situations when something is not okay and how to demonstrate that without falling into the punishment trap.
[00:08:34] We don't want his takeaway to be I need to get better at lying. We want his takeaway to be, wow, I really risk losing something when I lie to my parents. I risk losing freedom, independence, and things I want. I don't want him to think he's risking losing our love. But is it okay to be disappointed by your kid's actions and tell them that?
[00:08:55] Any guidance would be appreciated. So as always, I'm super grateful to this parent. I'm super grateful that they came into the community, took the time to write all of that out, asked for guidance. Like I mentioned, this is 100 percent something that parents of teenagers deal with. All of us have dealt with it.
[00:09:15] All of us are dealing with it. All of us will deal with it again. So it's really useful. And while all I know about this family is exactly what I just read. To you all, I'm going to take some liberties and play around with what was written so that we can look at it from perhaps a new angle, a new lens. So let's start with some possible reframes, kind of exploring what is the actual problem to be solved?
[00:09:43] What could be the beliefs behind behavior? So one of the pillars of positive discipline is mistakes or opportunities to learn. So as we're thinking about this challenge, right, what was the mistake. What was the mistake? So the first mistake made by the kiddo is taking advantage of the screen time agreement or not following through with the screen time expectations, right?
[00:10:11] So that's the first mistake. The second mistake was the kiddo lying about it, right? And listen, parents get really worked up about the lying, and I totally get it, you know, and these parents in particular, they have a kiddo that's in the early years of adolescence. And it's easy to feel like, Oh, my gosh, if he's lying now with such little effort, you know, I mean, we can go into so many worst case scenarios, like what is it going to look like when he's 15 If he thinks he can lie now, right?
[00:10:48] I remember Rowan at this age, 13, 14, 15 and the poker face that she could use when she would lie to us. And I knew she was lying. She could just take all expression off of her face and it was super concerning. Of course it was concerning. And seemingly she had no remorse or feeling bad about lying or keeping things from us.
[00:11:15] So I have experienced it. I know the feeling about it. And I know that this post is really centering the lying, but I want to talk about it. A few other things that I read in this post.
[00:11:34] So first of all, celebrating that this parent has a good relationship with their kiddo. It makes sense that he wants to avoid letting you down or getting into trouble, disappointing you. That makes sense, especially if the relationship is intact and strong, right? Screens. And the lure of more screen time is real, right?
[00:12:01] Listen to my podcast with Julieta that came out on Monday. We talk all about screens and agreements and how to respond when agreements get broken. If you haven't listened, I would definitely check that out. And our kids are going to make mistakes, right? Screens are a privilege and with the privilege comes responsibility.
[00:12:22] Always with any privilege comes responsibility. And part of the responsibility. Of a privilege is following through with the co created agreements and being honest about it. So yeah, honesty can live under the umbrella. of responsibility. Absolutely. Right? I feel the distress this parent is experiencing with this lie.
[00:12:52] And as many mentioned in the comments on this post, our kids lie. It's developmentally Uh, appropriate to navigate our tweens and teens telling lies. Humans! Humans lie. We cover things up. We try to save our ass all the time. Is it a great character trait? No, not really. Can it become problematic? Yeah. Is there a perfect response to ensure that our kids never lie to us again?
[00:13:22] No. So this parent wrote, What are the consequences for lying? I know we need to look at his motivation for lying, which is that he didn't want us to be mad or disappointed, but we are disappointed. Is it fair to communicate without shaming him? So the reframe that I am going to play with today is how can we share our disappointment without shaming our kid and land that we are always going to value honesty even when it's hard to be with the mistakes or misbehavior that our kiddo is getting into, right?
[00:14:00] How do we land that? Because I think that's ultimately what the parent wants to do, right? We're going to love you no matter what. And lying is not okay. It's not the direction you want to go in. So yeah, I think it's okay to let your kiddo know that you're disappointed about his choices, right? So let's look at some tools and strategies that might be useful.
[00:14:23] It's okay to let your kiddo know that you're disappointed about his choices. First, his choice around breaking the screen time agreement. Again, I'm assuming here that there was a clear agreement that he was part of contributing to. And second, right, you're disappointed that he felt like he had to lie about it.
[00:14:44] I would also encourage you to get curious about his response being, I lied because I didn't want you to be mad. I think many of us would love to avoid others being disappointed or mad at us and do all sorts of things to make sure that it doesn't happen. You know, full grown adults, hopefully the things that we do to make sure people aren't disappointed or mad is we do the right thing.
[00:15:09] We follow through with our word, right? We do what we say we're going to do. But a 13 year old, may not do those things. A 13 year old may take that shortcut of lying to avoid the discomfort of his parents being mad at him, right? Again, developmentally appropriate, something they're going to explore and try on.
[00:15:32] So the first tool or strategy, one of my favorites, talk about it all the time here on the pod. Curiosity. Get to be curious. Tell me about how you felt when we realized that you had broken the screen agreement. What was that like for you? And then listen. Tell me more. Tell me more. Listen. Talk about how it felt to start making up that story when you decided to lie about it.
[00:16:00] How did that feel? And then listen. Tell me more. Tell me more. Right? You want to kind of draw forth his experience for you and for him. How did it feel when we confronted you when we knew that you had lied and we confronted you about it? How did that feel? Right? Tell me more. Tell me more. You want to just, Oh yeah, that's, that makes sense.
[00:16:24] I hear you. Mirror what you're hearing. What did you think would happen if we knew you chose to be on the screen more than was expected? Like, you didn't want to get in trouble. You didn't want us to be mad. How did you think that would play out? Right? If we found out that you had been on the screen, what was he avoiding?
[00:16:45] Was he avoiding the, just that feeling of knowing you were going to be mad? Was he avoiding the potential punishment? I'm curious about that. You should be too. And it'd be, it's really useful for him to also be in the consideration of, yeah, what was I avoiding? Why didn't I want to tell the truth? right?
[00:17:07] And he might not know in the time, but you get to plant those seeds of critical thinking and consideration and reflection. And that's really useful. That will serve him in the future. So in other words, walk him back through the experience and ask questions to help him connect some dots about where things went sideways, right?
[00:17:29] You could even go farther back than the lie and be like, okay, so you were on your screen. You knew you had 60 minutes. You got to the 60 minute mark. How did that feel? Because I'll tell you what the screens as talked about on Monday, it is very challenging for our kiddos to manage on their own. without extra help when it's time to put the screens down, especially if they're actively engaged.
[00:17:59] So you might even want to go back even further just to that point where he decides, I'm just going to keep playing, right? We want him to connect some dots. The other tool that I think is really important in situations like this is showing faith. Right? Showing faith in your kiddo and showing faith could sound like, Hey buddy, we love you and we know that you care about our relationship and we're so glad about that, right?
[00:18:35] It makes sense that you wanted to cover your tracks rather than disappoint us or deal with us being mad at you. We get that. We know that over time, through experiences, you're going to continue to learn that honesty is always the best choice. We love you no matter what, even when we wish that you made better decisions.
[00:19:00] It's okay. We're still going to love you. Right? So we get to be with, like explicitly be with, this is all, we're all in this learning container, right? And the way that we learn is through experiences and we trust. That all of this learning is going to funnel you into this incredible human, who you are right now, but are going to continue to develop into.
[00:19:29] Right? Show faith. The other piece, I think, that's really an important tool or strategy is to reiterate that privileges come with responsibility. And without responsibility, the privileges go away, right? Screen privileges, they come. with an agreement, right? So it might be time for you to revisit the current agreement and see where there might be some tweaks that can be made.
[00:19:58] You get to be explicit about honesty around screens being a part of the responsibility. And when responsibility isn't met, there may be some restrictions around the screens. There might be a break, right? You might need to just take a break from the screens. And I love asking kids what they feel like would be fair.
[00:20:19] So, you didn't meet the responsibility and now we need to restrict the screens for a bit. What do you think would be fair? They're so much harder on themselves than we are on them. And this is also a great time to remind him that this is all really good practice for so many privileges that are coming in the years ahead.
[00:20:40] Privileges like freedom and exploring the world. Privileges around driving, going to parties, like, it's coming. He's 13, but before you know it, he's going to be 15, 16, 17. He's going to be wanting to know that he can do the things he wants to do, and that you're going to be comfortable with it because you trust him.
[00:21:07] So, yay! Training! This is time for training. Yes, you want to trust that he's going to be making good choices and you want to trust that when he makes mistakes, and he will, that he feels like he can come to you for help if he needs it. Or, trust that you can handle it without making him feel worse. Like, this is huge for me, I think, right?
[00:21:33] We want to trust that they're out in the world making good choices. while also believing and trusting that when they screw up, because they will, that they, rather than making up some story to cover their tracks, that they feel like they can come to us for help, right? And that they believe and trust us, that we can handle it without making them feel worse.
[00:21:57] Right? The parent wrote, I really struggle sometimes with PD on how to react in situations when something is not okay and how to demonstrate that without falling into the punishment trap. We don't want his takeaway to be, I need to get better at lying. We want his takeaway to be, wow, I really risk losing something when I lie to my parents.
[00:22:18] I risk losing freedom, independence, things that I want. I don't want him to think he's risking losing our love. So here's what I think. And again, I don't know this family, but I know lots of families and I believe this to be true. I think this kiddo knows that the lying isn't okay. I don't think you need to drill it in.
[00:22:43] I think he knows lying isn't okay. And that the breach in the screen time agreement wasn't okay either. Otherwise, he wouldn't have lied about it, right? I don't think it takes a punitive consequence to land the message. And listen, we all struggle with this. The struggle, to me, That struggle of positive discipline.
[00:23:03] What does this look like? The struggle is an indication that you want to be thoughtful, that you get the importance of kindness and firmness of maintaining connection while teaching the lesson. And it's tricky. There is no perfect, okay, he lied, so this is what you do, formula. We have a lot of things to consider.
[00:23:25] And what if instead of, The takeaway being, I risk losing something when I lie to my parents. What if we shift into the takeaway being, I don't need to lie to my parents? I mean, yes, I risk losing something when I lie to my parents and get caught. I get that, but how about really leaning into this reframe around, I don't need to lie to my parents, right?
[00:23:52] Yep. I was on my screen. I was really into the game. I could see what time it was. I knew I was pushing it. I knew I was over my limit and I just wanted to keep playing. I'm really sorry. What if they felt like they could say that to us and be real to us? without needing to lie. They know lying isn't okay.
[00:24:14] They look around the world, they don't see people lying to each other, hopefully, right? And books and movies and TV shows, there's tons of lessons around lying not being the greatest option, right? They know. And 13, 15, 17, 51, there still might be things that feel too big or too scary or too humiliating to come clean on.
[00:24:40] And so, We choose to lie. Sometimes we get away with it, even if the internal turmoil exists. Sometimes we don't, and we have to deal with the consequences. But I think your kiddo knows that lying isn't okay. So, curiosity, showing faith, right? Talking about privileges and responsibility, and honesty being a part of that responsibility.
[00:25:07] And remembering, ultimately, what you want for him is to know, I don't need to lie to my parents. Right? I don't need to lie to my parents. And maybe you get to be explicit and let him know that too, like, Hey, here's the energy and the environment that I want to create with you. This is the relationship I want to have with you.
[00:25:26] I want you to believe that you don't need to lie to us, that you never need to lie to us, that you can always come to us and talk to us. and let us know when you've made a mistake.
[00:25:46] So what's the personal growth work for this kind of challenge? What does the parent need to let go of? Practical tips for staying grounded and regulated? I mean, I think we all have our own personal relationship with honesty and lying, and maybe there's something in your history or your conditioning that makes being lied to like a dagger into the heart.
[00:26:14] Some people, and you see it in the comments on this post, like some people are like, nah, it's part of the territory, you don't need to get so worked up. And others are like, you gotta really nip this in the bud, it could become a challenge. So we all come to whatever the misbehavior is that we're dealing with, with our own bag of conditioning around it, right?
[00:26:33] So, That's the first thing that I would say is like, what's your relationship with honesty and lying and how can you untangle this behavior of your child from whatever it was, however it was, you were hurt. in the past, right? So there's that work. And again, we're reframing this whole thing into how can we share our disappointment without shaming our kiddo and land that we're always going to value honesty, even when it's hard to be with the mistakes or misbehavior that our kiddo is getting into.
[00:27:06] So yeah, share your disappointment. I'm bummed. I am so bummed that you felt like you had to lie to us, and I'm working through it. Share your disappointment, and then move on. You don't need to, like, wallow in it, because that's when it starts to become shamey. Something I remember saying to Ian, was because he didn't like it when I was mad at all.
[00:27:30] It was very uncomfortable to him. And I would say like, listen, I am disappointed. I'm upset. Your actions affect others. And one of the consequences of that is dealing with them, sharing your frustration with you. So that's a natural consequence. right, is how people respond when with their disappointment or their anger.
[00:27:52] I think if we aren't going on and on about it, but instead just simply showing our humanness, we aren't creating a shameful situation. I also think and believe wholeheartedly that there is an opportunity here to celebrate, right? Like, yes, an experience for your kiddo to put in their back pocket, which at 13 years old, the back pocket of experiences is pretty empty, right?
[00:28:21] We want them to have experiences in their back pocket to learn from, right? Yeah, I'm disappointed, but I'm also glad that we get to work through this together and get closer and learn together. Right? I'm also stoked to have this opportunity to make sure you know that we deeply value honesty. Right? This is a good thing.
[00:28:45] This is a good thing and it's a mindset shift, right? The personal growth work I want to invite this parent and all of you listening in to is that the mistakes your kids make through the teen years and beyond have the potential to teach them amazing lessons and develop them into incredible humans. If we remember that our response matters.
[00:29:11] When we can stay out of fear and anger and future tripping and stay in curiosity and trust in the present moment, we can support them. With developing the life skills we want them to learn to embody by the time they're out on their own in the world. And by the way, Even once they're out in the world on their own, they're still going to be making mistakes, just like we all do.
[00:29:38] It's not the punishment that does the teaching. It's the relationship he has with you. The conversations you have and the encouragement and faith that you maintain in him growing through what he's going through. You get to trust him to learn through his experiences. And he probably will experiment again with the truth and you get to say, yeah, here we are again.
[00:30:06] Okay. I'm curious about this. You get to hold him in love and compassion and remember that mistakes, which includes lying are opportunities to learn and grow and develop. And like I said, you also get to check your own relationship with lying and honesty. Are you taking this personally? Are you keeping it about your son and his growing character?
[00:30:31] And if you're listening to this and living with a teen that is chronically lying, I want you to ask yourself, again, is this a kid problem or is this a relationship problem? Stay curious. Stay nonjudgmental. Come from love and concern. Ask yourself, am I a safe person for them to be honest, right? Some of you might have kids that are in the muck of maybe experimenting with substances or in some really high risk behavior.
[00:31:01] So I'm not saying that that's always the case, but I would encourage you to go there. Right? If you're of a kiddo who's doing a lot of lying, like, I want to get under the surface. They know, even kids that lie a lot know it's not okay to lie. And yet there's something else going that's going on that's driving them.
[00:31:20] You know, it could be around belonging and significance. It could be around saving face. It could be a lot of things. Right? So stay curious, stay curious and have faith in your kiddo. You are a thoughtful parent. The one that wrote in and all of you that are listening, you want to get this right. You want to be who your kiddo needs you to be.
[00:31:40] I'm not worried about your child, right? I'm not worried. You're on top of it. And you listeners, you are also so thoughtful and caring. Otherwise, you wouldn't be taking the time to listen to this podcast. So I see you, I know that it's messy. You might have follow up questions. Remember that you can reach out to the community.
[00:32:03] Join the Joyful Courage for Parents of Teens Facebook group. Or if you want to book an explore call with me, go to besproutable. com slash explore. You'll get a 15 minute call. I can share with you about what I can offer. I can listen to a little bit of your story. Let's connect in this new year, 2025. I hope that this show was helpful.
[00:32:28] Please share it with others, share it on your social, share it with friends, head to Apple podcasts to leave a review. This is so important. It makes it so that others in the world get recommended the podcast. So please leave a review and just happy new year. Happy 2025 friends. I'm so glad to get to continue to connect with you
[00:32:52] here on the pod, out in community I'll be back next week with a new interview on Monday and a solo show on Thursday. All right, friends, bye.
[00:33:03] [Music] Thank you so much for listening in today. Thank you so much to my Sproutable partners, Julietta and Alana, as well as Danielle for And Chris Mann and the team at Podshaper for all the support with getting this show out there and helping it to sound so good. Check out our offers for parents with kids of all ages and sign up for our newsletter to stay better connected at besproutable.
[00:33:36] com. Tune back in on Monday for a brand new interview and I will be back solo with you next Thursday. Have a great day. [Music]