Excellent advice. Thanks for the ping.
My oldest is grounded for lying, then lying about not lying.
She threw a fit of course that she couldnt go to the big football game. Im the bad guy. (someone has to be)
I reminded her mother (who is often lax) that we have to stand firm as this is one of the defining battles as she approaches her teens, we MUST win. I thought I taught her (my oldest daughter) the value of truth and dont understand what went wrong, but one way or the other it will be corrected.
My wife understood once I asked her that what if she says she is going to a friends house, but really is going to a wild party? Suddenly the value of truth was reconfirmed in her mind. Ive tried repeatedly to get my wife to dump the notion of her daughter as her best friend.
Anyway I wrote miss untruthful a note and slipped it under her door being as she was holed up in there pouting.
I hope she understood and is more willing to discuss things this evening. If not grounding will continue until truthfulness improves.
My oldest was particularly self-centered the summer before last. When I had had enough of the lack of gratitude for all that was done for her, she had to list 100 things she appreciated about being in our family - no repeats - and was not allowed to go anywhere until she finished. I was looking for certain things to be in that list of 100, which she actually did end up listing. After it was done, she was to read her list every night before bed for the next week. She's much improved in the area of appreciation and recognizing that she's not the only one on the planet.