Raider

No I have not. As I said I do not see the benefit of it. Although I asked my husband, hey do you eat on the couch after I go to bed? He said no. I continue to find utensils between the cushions. Hahahahaha. That cracks me up.

Hammer

It is not a benefit.

This is more like a Mental Illness or Spiritual Illness thing.

The Lying is "Compulsive" about like an A with Alcohol.

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Had a college girlfriend who would stuff chicken bones in the couch. God. What a pig.

At least this one is a veggie. But still leaves a mess behind.

ladyscribbler

Just flat-face, straight-out lies.

Have you ever seen something like that?

Yes, with my ex husband (who wasn't an alcoholic). Just a compulsive liar. He would lie about the most bizarre, ridiculous things. He once came in from a thunderstorm and told me he had just gotten struck by lightning. No kidding. I was like, the next time you tell me some junk like that, your hair better be on fire. But he kept doing it, so I divorced him. I couldn't live with someone I couldn't trust. So I went right out and got myself involved with an A.
But I'm learning. Best wishes, man. I know lying has been a major trigger for me. And as Carlotta said, a crisis. I just love to swoop in and save the day. I'm so freaking noble.
Thank God for alanon. I'd still be a real mess otherwise.

HealingWillCome

Bingo, jessicajoe. Those were my triggers, too. Anything that hinted of abandonment triggered the codependent "I need you" in me. Until I finally connected with why I was choosing alcoholics in the first place--trying to heal an abandonment wound from my alcoholic father leaving me. Except that I was injecting the wrong kind of drug...another alcoholic. Bad idea, that replacement therapy.

The old triggered, subconscious, controlling me: "I gotta have you. (You're my drug, you're going to heal me.) I'm only happy with you. (You're my drug, you're going to heal me.) Where are you? (I need my drug, you're going to heal me.) Are you going to leave me? (What will I do without my drug that is supposed to heal me, not effing hurt me?)"

Healthy, no-longer-little-girl-victim me: "What? You would dare to not answer my calls? (Buh-bye.) You would dare to not answer my texts? (Buh-bye.) You would dare to give me the silent treatment? (Buh-bye.) You would show me in even the tiniest way that you can't be trusted? (Buh-bye.)"

Thanks for the thread, Hammer. I like ones that make me think, learn, process the ick, and remind me how far I've come.

Hammer

Thanks.

What left me sort of dazed and confused at first was my sponsor nor none of my best Long-Timer Alananny Angels had dealt with it. They all had partners who worked the program, as well, but never experienced the Compulsive Lying thing.

Got all my inside scoop on what was going on from the AA side. I talked to dozens, who would refer me to a few. Maybe 1 in 10, or maybe 1 in 20 will get "struck" (like lightning ) with Compulsive Lying in their first year of AA, or post-rehab, or whatever you call the end of the prior addiction.

Just hits them hard and knocks them almost powerless to not lie. When I have cornered Mrs. Hammer, she just starts more layers of lies to cover the prior lies. Not in her before-rehab character at all. She would lie some before, but after . . . . So bizarre to watch. I think she knows she is lying. The other AA-ers who have been through this say they knew they were lying -- just totally powerless to stop.

I understand some of the Brain Hardware issues. There seems to some ties towards addictions and other disorders. Whole sites on it and Wiki, too.

What is Compulsive Lying Disorder? | Compulsive Lying Disorder

Pseudologia fantastica - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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From the description from the AA folks it reminds me of a Jesus story. Just get rid of one demon (addiction, as it), and more come in to its place. The AA folks say they only managed to get out of it by Getting a Strong Local Sponsor, Much Prayer, and Really Working the Program. (good advice, btw, for many/most of us, as well).

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Luke, Chapter 11 --

24 "When an impure spirit comes out of a person, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, 'I will return to the house I left.'

25 When it arrives, it finds the house swept clean and put in order.

26 Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that person is worse than the first."

AnvilheadII

so let's take this a step further....do we like the alcoholic find ways to SET UP that "first drink"? triggers have been mentioned here a lot...as an addict myself i can state categorically that trigger is just another word for EXCUSE. a conditioned excuse to go all victim and helpless and LET the beast have it's way...........

Hammer

dunno. I do not think the kids or I "set up" Mrs. Hammer to lie. It seems more like something is going on in her head, and her mouth opens and the lie pops out.

Now how we handle that Lie is where the "First Drink" part seems to occur. Do we take it to heart, argue about it, start gossiping on the side . . . OR . . . simply understand the Lie is a product of a (at least at that place and time) disordered mind?

Like if she had Tourette Syndrome, or Epilepsy. (which are entirely different areas of the brain from Lying) She "knows" or could reasonable know that what is coming out of her mouth is a Lie. But it is "Compulsive" so she may be having a very difficult time controlling it or maybe it is even intentional as an attempt to elicit sympathy, or an emotional "high," or cover for another embarrassment.

For my part I can go into Court Room Drama "proving" (to no one who cares) it is a Lie, OR I can simply dismiss it as a Lie.

Dogs bark, Cats meow, Cows mooo, . . . . and Compulsive Liars . . . Lie. It is what they do. Else that would not have any meaning.

AnvilheadII

nope, not what I meant Hammer....I didn't ask how you might set HER up or even what SHE does...I asked what it is that WE let GET to us that "allows" us to go to that First Drink.

small example...for some reason when hank is off of work (he's in masonry construction, it happens!) I can be at work and start fretting over what he IS or is NOT doing at the house - compared to what I think SHOULD be done. he doesn't exactly go crazy on the housework, catch my drift? so I can work myself up into quite a state....before I ever get within 10 miles of the house, and have a "trigger" or "condition" set up....if I walk in that door and he has NOT <<fill in the blank>> then i'm gonna be pissed.

I am setting myself UP to get upset...I've already identified a "trigger" that I have given myself permission to use in order to justify getting mad. and create discord, strife and hostility.

for no.damn.reason. I still don't know WHY I do that....but I've become way more aware when I start and I try to make sure I don't blast in the door with guns blazing.

there is NEVER going to come a day when hank will grab the remote, leap OUT of the recliner, turn OFF SportsCenter and say....damn, I gotta vacuum!!! and yet I can still have expectations that he will. I know who he is...how he is....what he does.

the same as you know that your wife does what she does....as you have attributed, a compulsive liar. it's not new, it's not a surprise.

if we live with active alcoholics, WE KNOW THAT THEY DRINK. and yet still find a way to be surprised, or disappointed, or upset.

so i'm asking, do we set ourselves up sometimes? or is it ALWAYS them??

lillamy

oh you and me both, babe.

I take it a step further: It doesn't have to be a crisis. I am The Crisis Averter (imagine if I was part of the Avengers, what a boring-ass movie it would be???). Whenever I hear Person X say something to Person Y that Person Y may interpret as a slight or insult, I zoom into action and either throw a joke in there (weapon of choice) or try to soften the blow of Person X's comment.

Any time I smell confrontation (or even the potential thereof), I reach for my... well, not revolver, more like... fluffy puppy... or something.

Because you know people can't handle their own relationships without me stepping in. (See my superhero cape flying in the night breeze.)

MissFixit

i agree with anvil.

you know your wife lies and has issues. expecting her to be honest is only setting yourself up for disappointment. why do you keep going to the hardware store for bread?

Regroup

For me right now it had to be coming to see him for our anniversary hoping that things were different. I continue to drink the poison and it's slowly killing me. I believed that he was getting help and not drinking and I was surprised and hurt when I found the truth in the cans... I continue to let him back in at any sign of "change" and take the first drink.

Hammer

ahhhh. ewwwww.

To accept that she REALLY is / or will continue to be a Compulsive Liar?

Sorry. I AM Not There, Yet.

Sorry. Just not there.

For all my talk -- I can only accept that it is something that she is doing . . . for now. Just for some little while NOW.

Not "who she is."

Sorry. Just Not There.

Sort of hope maybe I never will be.

Look. Part of my acceptance is that she has a Long Term Mental Illness. I can even speak those words without have weird attacks anymore.

But to say that she IS a Compulsive Liar (like for life or something). Can't do that.

But you are correct -- if I did -- the whole "First Drink" Press-This-Button thing would be shut down.

AnvilheadII

all you have is NOW Hammer....you are the one who has given her the labels of compulsive liar, person with long term mental illness....it comes thru your posts pretty much daily. it's a GIVEN, for NOW. kind of like where the doorways are in our house....if we do not properly gauge our spatial relationship to said doorway, we are probably gonna whack into it!!! as i have a lousy sense of peripheral anything, i do this alot. in fact, i banged my elbow into my car door just this morning.

my knee jerk reaction, is OW, DAMMIT, can i not get thru a DAY without banging into something??? that's an after-event reaction.

where the difference lies if i begin to EXPECT doors and door jams and walls and coffee tables to move, OUT of my way. the doorway has no "fault" in the matter....it's doing what it does...the table leg didn't set out to bang into my knee...what good would it do me to get up in a lather and say, i swear if i bang into that table today i'm going to burn it in the fire pit!!!!

if i'm REALLY concerned about what happens when part of me bangs against part of it/them....then i have choices....i can have the doorways widened, hank can get busy building me that bubblewrap suit, i can start wearing elbow and shin guards! i could even TRY to have a bit more control over my appendages and watch where in the hell i'm going! or i can accept that there is a distinct likelihood with a high probability rate that sometime within the next 3 hours you will hear me saying, OUCH, dammit!

my intention wasn't to zone in on you...or your wife. i was asking more globally what are the things WE do to set ourselves up for anger, sadness, disappointment....much as long before the alcoholic TAKES a drink, his mind is taken with the IDEA of the drink and then proceeds to SET UP a situation however contrived so that that first drink becomes OK?

FireSprite

I do this, OMG I am so guilty of this exact thing.

I became pretty aware of it over the last month or so though & it has given me a lot of insight (yet again) over what belongs on my side vs. his side of the street & yet another example of how those stinking expectations creep in when you aren't looking. RAH is never, ever, ever on his BEST day going to look at the house and *see* what needs to be done the same way I do & me walking in with a crappy attitude, already half-set up for an argument day after day was hurting ME more than anyone.

I don't know why I kept expecting this to change just because I wanted it to.

Thank you for sharing this example!

jessicajoe

Anvil YES This makes perfect sense to me.

I know this is minor by comparison but its what I'm thinking. Yesterday for the first time in over 40 days my partner didn't text me when he arrived at AA. Its nothing to do with his recovery (that's his business) and he could have been texting me "I'm there" from the bar on the corner and I wouldn't know any different. Its more to do with the habit we have fallen into over the years of texting our whereabouts to each other "leaving work" "on the bus" (you call it codependent, I call it romantic )
Anyway no one had made him texting me from AA a rule and he had done nothing "wrong" by not texting. I knew that eventually there would be a day he didn't text it. He sometimes forgets to lift his phone and he sometimes forgets to charge it, but when he didn't text yesterday my brain went straight to "he didn't go to AA, where is he?" When he got home I in true codie fashion manipulated the conversation around to asking why he didn't text and "I'm sorry babe, the meeting had already started. It was text or coffee and coffee won" He was completely nonplussed and the text obviously didn't have the significance for him that I had created around it.
I completely set myself up for that stomach chewing two hours over absolutely nothing.
Go figure.

NorCaliGal

Yes! This!

And for me it's also that it's as if I'm not supposed to notice that my ABF is drunk. After drinking daily in the afternoon before I get home/in the garage/after I've gone to upstairs to read, etc. (even though he openly states that he is not interested in trying to be sober right now, he doesn't drink in front of me at home) my ABF will stumble around and try to act as if nothing is amiss, and I'm supposed to not notice that he's been drinking or that he's sh*tfaced drunk. Like he's trying to prove something: "look, I'd been drinking and YOU COULDN'T EVEN TELL!" I feel like my intelligence is being insulted. On a daily basis. Oooh that pisses me off!

I think this partly stems from the fact that I am angry with myself for not trusting my gut early on in our relationship about his drinking. I'd see or hear something and think wow, it's as if he's been drinking, but then talk myself out of it (no, he's not a big drinker, he doesn't drink more than two beers when we go out, it's six am he couldn't be drunk, etc.) I am so angry with myself for not listening to my own instincts.

Very thought provoking thread Hammer!

NCG

F50Lurker

If you mean what triggers me to behave codependently, or "cave in" to whatever I promised myself I wouldn't do... I would say it's a particular softness he gets in his voice from time to time. It is probably consciously manipulative, but it just melts my heart every time and I go doooowwwwnnnn.....

POAndrea

I guess my "first drink" is having the expectation that now, all of a sudden, just because he is no longer drinking he will be repentant and contrite, and will speak considerately. Don't get me wrong: that compulsive lying irritates me too, even though it has almost disappeared in the two months my (r?)AH has been sober. But what REALLY burns my biscuits is the "Well, yes, but what about you?" that replaced the dishonesty. As in, "Well, yes, I DID knock over the Christmas tree last year and break most of the ornaments, but remember the second winter we were married when you ran the snowblower over the doormat and you had to go buy a new one?" Zero to 60mph in 2 seconds and 100 yards, guaranteed. It's very hard not to become furious and jump right in/on him, because I am really trying to be careful to avoid nagging at him about things that happened in the past. Not an especially productive activity, and more importantly, I believe he genuinely feels awful as he becomes aware of what he has done and how it has impacted our family.

I never point them out, but I'm not comfortable lying to him when he asks "Where are all the decorations? Don't we have more than one Christmas box?" I am getting better at answering honestly, dispassionately and nonconfrontationally by pretending I'm testifying and stick to just the facts, ma'am. ("You fell into the tree last year. I took you to the hospital because I couldn't get all the glass out of your hands and face. The new scar on your forehead is from the 12 stitches you needed.") THis happens a lot, as he has no recollections whatsoever of the past several years and is just now fully observing the physical destruction. ("How did grammy's steamer chest get charred like that?" "Why does the couch stink?") and the social damage ("How come I'm not in any of the pictures from my mother's 75th birthday party?" "When did our daughter get engaged?")

I have such a hard time remembering that now he is sober enough to recognize the damage he did he probably is suffering as much now as we did when it was actually happening. Unfortunately, he's not sober enough to take responsibility for those actions without taking offense as well. I understand he is struggling with the guilt/shame, but I sure wish he would find another way to process his response without pointing out everyone else's shortcomings too.

AnvilheadII

excellent post POAndrea....but i'm curious....new doormat or new slowblower?

POAndrea

Doormat, thank G-d! Chewed that poor thing right up into little bits and threw 'em in the yard. And then I ran the pieces over with the lawnmower all the next summer!