Why People With Addiction Lie

Table of ContentsView AllTable of ContentsAvoiding ConfrontationAvoiding Forced ChangeEscaping NegativityLoved Ones May Enable LyingBrain ChangesFear of Life Without AddictionAvoiding ShameDenialTo Avoid Being CaughtBrain Chemistry ChangesFrequently Asked Questions

Table of ContentsView All

View All

Table of Contents

Avoiding Confrontation

Avoiding Forced Change

Escaping Negativity

Loved Ones May Enable Lying

Brain Changes

Fear of Life Without Addiction

Avoiding Shame

Denial

To Avoid Being Caught

Brain Chemistry Changes

Frequently Asked Questions

Addictionleads to many changes in behavior, including in how people interact with others. This often includes lying to others, including their loved ones. While this happens for various reasons, including as a way to hide signs of addiction, it can create serious problems in interpersonal relationships.

A person with an addiction may lie about how often they use a substance or engage in a behavior. Or they may lie about where they are or what they are doing to cover up the fact thatthey are drinking alcohol, using substances, or engaging a something related to a behavioral addiction.

Learning more about why people who have an addiction may lie can provide insight. It can also help friends, family, and others better understand how to respond to this behavior more effectively.

Why People With Addiction Lie

Someone with an addiction may often want to avoidconfrontationbecause they’ve used their addictive behavior as a coping strategy for so long, they often don’t have other well-developed ways of dealing with the stresses of life.

When tackling a difficult topic, try to stay matter-of-fact about it. Use language to reflect your own perspective, rather than blaming your friend or loved one.

In some ways, someone with an addiction may be stubborn. They know their behavior isn’t in anyone’s best interests, especially their own, but have decided it works for them, and they are sticking to it. They might lie about the extent of their addictive behavior, because they want to avoid you pressuring them to change.

Eventually, they can and do change when they realize the consequences of their behavior will continue to worsen unless they do something different.

Try to provide information that might influence your friend or loved one to make up their own mind to change, instead of trying to persuade them to change.

A person who is dealing with an addiction can often see their behavior as a kind of holding pattern, hoping things will work themselves out and theaddictionwill disappear.

Try to focus on what will be better if things change, not what will be worse if they don’t.

There may be times when you knowyour loved one just liedbecause you know what really happened. But for some reason, you might allow them to lie without letting them know that you know. This is an example of enabling an addiction.

What Is Enabling?Enabling refers to doing things for a person that they can do for themselves. These behaviors allow the person to continue their addiction without experiencing the consequences of their own behaviors.

What Is Enabling?

Enabling refers to doing things for a person that they can do for themselves. These behaviors allow the person to continue their addiction without experiencing the consequences of their own behaviors.

This sends one of two messages:

In this case, either avoid discussing the subject completely or simply state what you know happened, rather than going along with the lie.

How to Recognize Enabling

An addiction such as alcohol use disorder can cause damage to parts of the brain such as the frontal lobe. Such damage has been shown to increase the potential for deviant behavior such as increased risk-taking or lying.

If you are constantly catching your loved one in a lie, it’s possible that this behavior is physiological. This is all the more reason to be sensitive to your loved one’s struggles, and do as much as you can to help them turn things around.

Life Without Addiction Can Seem Like a Void

For someone with an addiction, life can often revolve around theiraddictive behavior. Although they plan to quit “one day,” for today, life without their addiction seems frighteningly empty. If you don’t understand how this emptiness drives people back into their addictive behavior, they will tune in to that and lie to shut you up.

Mention in a kind and positive way what you would like to see happening instead of the addictive behavior, preferably before the addictive behavior becomes part of your routine.

Addictions often make the people around them behave in ways that cause them embarrassment and regret. When you point this out, they may lie to avoid feeling ashamed.

Going along with such a lie is a form of enabling that may avoid outward embarrassment but will do nothing to relieve your loved one’s inner emotional pain.

A person who has an addiction may simply be in denial that their behavior is a problem. However, they may be aware that other people might not feel the same way—which then results in lying.

By not being forthcoming, people are able to then stay in denial about the problem.

Lying often serves another important purpose, which is to avoid getting caught. This might be due to the fact that the individual is addicted to an illicit substance, and they are concerned about the legal and judicial ramifications of their addiction coming to light.

In other cases, they might be worried about the potential personal costs of being caught, such as losing their relationships or job.

Addiction can create changes in how the brain works, including in the reward systems that often play a part in different types of goal-directed behavior. Addictive substances and behaviors create intense highs that serve to reinforce the experience.

Over time, the brain adapts to these addictive substances, changing the brain’s chemistry so that it is unable to active those reward paths on its own. This fuels the need to use the substance in order to continue experiencing the same pleasant feelings.

Lying might occur because people are no longer making rational decisions about their lives and their behavior.

It isn’t always easy to tell if someone is lying, and some people may be much better able to disguise their dishonesty. One of the best ways to tell if you are being lied to is to notice changes in characteristic behaviors or to corroborate what the person is telling you using other sources of information.A few red flags that might indicate that someone is lying include being vague and repeating your questions before answering them.Learn More:How to Tell If Someone Is Lying

It isn’t always easy to tell if someone is lying, and some people may be much better able to disguise their dishonesty. One of the best ways to tell if you are being lied to is to notice changes in characteristic behaviors or to corroborate what the person is telling you using other sources of information.A few red flags that might indicate that someone is lying include being vague and repeating your questions before answering them.

It isn’t always easy to tell if someone is lying, and some people may be much better able to disguise their dishonesty. One of the best ways to tell if you are being lied to is to notice changes in characteristic behaviors or to corroborate what the person is telling you using other sources of information.

A few red flags that might indicate that someone is lying include being vague and repeating your questions before answering them.

Learn More:How to Tell If Someone Is Lying

People with addiction may lie about whether they use certain substances or engage in certain behaviors. They may lie about what they were doing, who they were with, and what they spent money on. Other lies they might tell include how they obtained a substance, where they got the money to pay for the drug, and how the drug is affecting their life.

Learn More:How Do Neurotransmitters Work?

2 SourcesVerywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Ester M. Nakamura-Palacios, Rodrigo S. M. Souza, Maria P. Zago-Gomes, Adriana M. F. de Melo, Flávia S. Braga, Tadeu T. A. Kubo, Emerson L. Gasparetto.Gray Matter Volume in Left Rostral Middle Frontal and Left Cerebellar Cortices Predicts Frontal Executive Performance in Alcoholic Subjects.Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 2013; DOI: 10.1111/acer.12308National Institute on Drug Abuse.Introducing the human brain. Drugs, Brains, and Behavior: The Science of Addiction.Additional ReadingBradshaw J,Healing the Shame That Binds You. Boca Raton, FL: Health Communications, Inc.; 2010.

2 Sources

Verywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Ester M. Nakamura-Palacios, Rodrigo S. M. Souza, Maria P. Zago-Gomes, Adriana M. F. de Melo, Flávia S. Braga, Tadeu T. A. Kubo, Emerson L. Gasparetto.Gray Matter Volume in Left Rostral Middle Frontal and Left Cerebellar Cortices Predicts Frontal Executive Performance in Alcoholic Subjects.Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 2013; DOI: 10.1111/acer.12308National Institute on Drug Abuse.Introducing the human brain. Drugs, Brains, and Behavior: The Science of Addiction.Additional ReadingBradshaw J,Healing the Shame That Binds You. Boca Raton, FL: Health Communications, Inc.; 2010.

Verywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.

Ester M. Nakamura-Palacios, Rodrigo S. M. Souza, Maria P. Zago-Gomes, Adriana M. F. de Melo, Flávia S. Braga, Tadeu T. A. Kubo, Emerson L. Gasparetto.Gray Matter Volume in Left Rostral Middle Frontal and Left Cerebellar Cortices Predicts Frontal Executive Performance in Alcoholic Subjects.Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 2013; DOI: 10.1111/acer.12308National Institute on Drug Abuse.Introducing the human brain. Drugs, Brains, and Behavior: The Science of Addiction.

Ester M. Nakamura-Palacios, Rodrigo S. M. Souza, Maria P. Zago-Gomes, Adriana M. F. de Melo, Flávia S. Braga, Tadeu T. A. Kubo, Emerson L. Gasparetto.Gray Matter Volume in Left Rostral Middle Frontal and Left Cerebellar Cortices Predicts Frontal Executive Performance in Alcoholic Subjects.Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 2013; DOI: 10.1111/acer.12308

National Institute on Drug Abuse.Introducing the human brain. Drugs, Brains, and Behavior: The Science of Addiction.

Bradshaw J,Healing the Shame That Binds You. Boca Raton, FL: Health Communications, Inc.; 2010.

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