Is there such a thing as a compulsive lying disorder?

Question

My son who is now 23yrs old constantly tells lies.He makes arrangements for example he says he is coming to visit and does not turn up.I then phone him and he sais he never said he was coming to see me,he always manages to turn the whole situation around .Lie after lie comes out of his mouth and it is so upsetting as he is doing this to his family and all his freinds constantly.The lies become more elaborate as the conversation comes out of his mouth.Do you think he may possibly have some mental health disorder,I just want to be able to help him.

Answer 1

The Homeopathic Remedy OPIUM is prescribed to cure Pathological liars. Click the link to read more about it in the Materia Medica of Homeopathic Medicines :-
http://homeoint.org/books/boericmm/o/op.htm
Take Care and God Bless you !

Answer 2

There are a number of reasons that people lie. The first is fear. This is the most common reason that people may lie, and they are taking shelter from a perceived punishment. It may be because they know they have done something wrong a single time, in which case it is not compulsive lying. But if they are always in fear of being punished, it may become a habit, which is a second reason for lying. In this case, it may become compulsive lying, which is lying by reflex. Even when confronted by the truth, they insist the lie is the truth in this case. A third case is learning to lie through modeling. When a people see others lie, especially when they get away with it, they may become more prone to lying. Finally, people lie because they feel if they tell the truth they won't get what they want. Thus, out of the main reasons for lying, only lying by habit can truly be called "compulsive lying."

Increased lying has been seen with a number of psychiatric diagnoses such as ADHD and Bipolar Disorder. With ADHD people will often say "I don't know why I did that", and when confronted about why they lied, their answer will be the same. ADHD children also display impulsivity, and they may lie implusively. Bipolar Disorder can be associated with low serotonin levels, which has been implicated in impulsivity, which, as indicated before, makes a person more prone to lie.

Pathological lying, though, can be thought of as being associated with a select few psychiatric diagnoses, which normally have their onset during adolescence. Namely, these are Conduct Disorder and Antisocial Personality Disorder. In conduct disorder, it is common to seelying, conning people and other forms of deceit. In Antisocial Personality Disorder, there is a pervasive pattern of disregard or the rights of others, and with this, the person with this disorder will often lie to get what they wish – usually money, sex or power.

Answer 3

I think some of the answers have been confusing, this is not and I repeat not a classifiable mental disorder it is certainly not OCD and neither is it Munchhausen's. It would come under the wider diagnostic criteria of personality disorder and would be difficult to get help for.

There is a form of CBT known as schema focused therapy that claims to be able to work with this type of problem, it might be worth approaching your GP to see if it's available in your area, if it is then you have the greater task of persuading you boy to go along.

Good luck.

Answer 4

There are people who are compulsive liars, much like people obsessively clean, or even steal. He may very well have a disorder of some kind, but it's always best to check with a professional. Just tell him you know that he's lying, and bring up the idea, asking him whether and why he thinks he has to lie all the time.

Answer 5

No it's not Baron Munchausens syndrome, that's a bit different.

But I had a friend who is ALWAYS telling porkys, he really believes in his own lies, he's been that way for 40 years or more, how he keeps track of them I really dont know, everything he says seems to be true untill you find out later, then he tells more stories to cover up the first lot, and even they are believable! I kinda fell out with him years ago because I couldn't trust in anything he said.

Answer 6

It does sound like a type of mental illness where there has been a psychotic episode. You can look back on his history to find out if he was hospitalized. He would not have been able to work during one. At any rate the mental health professionals dont want an unmotivated patient and will let him become more depressed before they can get his cooperation.

Answer 7

There are people that lie so often (most of the time for seemingly no reason) that they believe the lies themselves. While growing up, did your son have to pick up after himself, apologize for being rude or mean to someone. Was he ever walked through the process of thinking about his consequences or others feelings?

Being the mother of 3 boys I can imagine how hard and frustrating this is. Nothing can be done till he decides to take ownership of his actions and starts caring about others. He simply wants the immediate gratification of getting everyone off his back immediately. When his wife and kids get sick of it, when it effects his job and other relationships, I hope you are there to help him to realize what he is doing. It is really self destructive behavior.

I would tell him: Son I love you more than you could imagine, but I need to stop involving myself in your self-destructive behavior. If you are going to come see me, great! I love seeing you, but from now I will not engage in this type of negative behavior.

You need to stop getting upset, it feeds his desire and need to keep controling everyone. There is a great deal of satisfaction and controll for him to have everyone upset because of his lies.

Lies only get bigger with time.

Answer 8

Pathological lying is not considered a mental health disorder on it's own, but can possibly be a sign of something greater than that.

There may also be a possibility that he may have problems associating imagination with reality and may actually wholeheartedly believe the lies he gives out (Confabulation).

Answer 9

In all honesty, your son has a problem and its going to get him into trouble or he'll end up very lonely.

The trouble will be getting him to talk to someone about it. Its not going to be easy. Perhaps you can sit him down and ask for an explanation, his response will tell you all you need to know. If he is aggressive and defensive, he may need some help. If not, you may get some answers.

Are there friends of his you can talk to about it, who could in turn talk to your son ? That may be a good route forward.

Maybe something in his past has triggered this, or it may even be depression, it manifests itself in many different ways.

I wish you the very best of luck and your son too

Answer 10

The trouble is, some people lie so much, they actually believe that what is coming out of their mouth is true. I'm not sure if this is a recognises Mental Health problem though.

Answer 11

There is it would be a personality disorder! There are many types depending on the behaviour. It all has to be persistent and quite extreme to get such a diagnosis but if it really affects your and his life so much then take him to a doctor and ask to see a psychiatrist.He could just be a liar and thats it but it sounds quite bad to me.