[brokenseekinghelp]

I am engaged to be married in a week, but only yesterday came clean about having cheated on my fiance shortly after we got engaged. I don't know why I did it other than my own selfish desires to be dangerous before getting married. It was stupid, but what was more stupid was that, even after getting caught, I couldn't tell the truth. Yesterday was the third time my fiance has had to sit down and listen to yet another version of what happened. This time, as well as I can tell considering I start believing my own lies, I have told him the truth.

However, I have absolutely destroyed his trust, and he isn't able to believe me. I am a compulsive liar. I don't know how to stop. I lie about the stupidest things - things like what I had for dinner last night. This is so much bigger, though. He's not even mad at me for the affair, he's angry and hurt by my deception, and the fact that it has been a foundation point since the start of our relationship. There were so many opportunities for me to come clean, and just accept what I'd done and the consequences of it. I don't know why I didn't, why I couldn't.

I've been going through DBT for my BPD in the last year, and that has helped me dramatically, but I haven't been able to address the lies. I've even lied to my therapist at times. My life is falling apart, and I'm hurting all the people I care the most about, including my unborn daughter, because of these lies. I can't live like this anymore, but I don't know where to go or what to do. I don't even know how to go about making amends for my lies. I don't know how to comfort, or prove myself again, or even start to change. I haven't been this close to cutting in almost six months, and I feel selfish for being so upset when it's all my own fault anyway. What should I do, where can I go? I need help and advice so badly...

[Travelinglady]

Have you told your therapist about your compulsive lying? I think that's the place to figure out why it's happening and what to do about it.

At least you finally did come clean. Maybe the bad consequences of lying can help you to think twice before you do it in the future.

Okay, folks, what suggestions/ thoughts do you have to give about BPD and/or the lying? I have told her what I think about the lying just now and what I thought about BPD in another post.

Hang in here, brokenseekinghelp.

[Kimaya]

Yipes... your husband is very stalwart or he needs you just as bad as you need him. I won't go into all the things that lying does to break a relationship because that isnt the issue here, you know its a problem.

I am sorry to hear you haven't been able to address the lies in therapy. I think you will need to get to the root of why you do lie before you can move forward. There is a reason somewhere in there, even if it seems random.

My husband has a problem similar to yours with dishonesty but the root of his is that he wants to avoid making a situation negative in any way. He lies about such minute things that sometimes it boggles my mind. But I have stayed with him, I need him of course, and he must need me since he puts up with my stuff too. He was seeing a therapist but I do not think they made much progress so I don't have advice there.

Let us know how things go with finding a therapy. I would address it as soon as possible, it may be linked (as hazarding a wild guess here) to distress intolerance or perhaps paranoid ideation in relationships. Maybe even at a sub level.

Stay strong, he hasn't given up on you and don't you go give up on yourself.