Therapy

So if I were to go to counseling for my compulsive lying issues, is there a particular kind of counselor/therapist I should be looking for? I'm looking in to something online because i'm living in a different place for the summer and have a really crazy work schedule, but i'm not sure if that's going to work. Anyway, whether online or face to face, are there certain ppl who specialize in this kind of thing or should I just go to see whoever?

I googled a little and it seems that the first line of treatment would be cognitive behavioral therapy. What a shocker. CBT seems to be the universal answer to all mental health problems and I bet you could call up any random psychologist and they'd offer CBT.

Unfortunately I don't have any personal recommendations for you, my lying isn't that bad and it's really more of an expression of my AvPD than anything else. I do suggest you to make an appointment with a flesh-and-bones therapist (you can start in the fall if now's not a good time... besides, the process is absolutely gonna take longer than a few months). And don't give up if the first method of therapy or therapist doesn't suit you. CBT hasn't actually taken over the world of psychology... yet.

Online therapy.. for lying.. is this a joke?
The people that specialize in this are able to help you, because they can either tell when your lieing, or hook you up to a lie detector.. online help.. you could just be making it all up, how would they know?

Find someone who is willing to use lie detectors, and such to make sure you actually get help on whats real, rather than what you want to be real.
If you want actual help, you're going to need to use extreme methods... if theres a time you will lie out of compulsion, its when under pressure from a shrink.. trust me, its ###$ a lot of my diagnosis up, had to use a lie detector.

-Eric_lee

Eric_Lee wrote:Online therapy.. for lying.. is this a joke?
The people that specialize in this are able to help you, because they can either tell when your lieing, or hook you up to a lie detector.. online help.. you could just be making it all up, how would they know?

Find someone who is willing to use lie detectors, and such to make sure you actually get help on whats real, rather than what you want to be real.
If you want actual help, you're going to need to use extreme methods... if theres a time you will lie out of compulsion, its when under pressure from a shrink.. trust me, its ###$ a lot of my diagnosis up, had to use a lie detector.

-Eric_lee

No, it's not a joke, though I get your point. I'm a bit desperate right now. Everything is coming to a head while I'm out in the woods at summer camp. As I said on my other post, I'm tempted to quit but if I did I would really screw over the ppl I'm working for (who I also happen to really like) and I have nowhere else to go. I move around a lot, so I don't have a permanent home anywhere. I guess I will have to be somewhere long-term eventually to work this thing all the way through, but I don't know where that's going to be right now. My "usual" jobs are seasonal and short term. This is one of the downsides of it. Anyway I figured getting some help online could at least get me through the breakdown stage and help me figure out how to survive the summer until I can get more help. I need someone who can give me some tips on how to deal with the immediate issues. I feel like that could be done online but maybe i'm wrong. My schedule is such that I would not be able to make a regular, weekly counseling appointment, so online, it seems to be, is a whole lot better than nothing.

Lie detectors?! Get real. How many therapist do you think have ever even thought of using lie detectors? Very few, I guarantee. Therapy doesn't focus on the lies, it focuses on the reasons behind the act of lying. The lying is simply a symptom. Like if you had social phobia then the facial blushing would be a symptom. You don't go to therapy and deal with the blushing problem, you deal with the reasons that caused the SP in the first place. Hatingme, you said you had anxiety and depression issues. Well, if you go to therapy you're gonna discuss the reasons behind your diagnoses. You're gonna learn new thinking patterns (talking about CBT here) and start challenging those negative thoughts and that process leads to better self-esteem, confidence, healthier relationships and THAT is what might cure the lying. The lying itself is nothing, it's the tip of the iceberg.

I don't know what kind of online therapy you mean - and face-to-face is still preferable, I'm sure you know that - but I know a few sites with the full CBT program. If nothing else, you might at least get a feel for it before actual therapy.

http://ecouch.anu.edu.au/welcome
http://moodgym.anu.edu.au/welcome
http://www.livinglifetothefull.com/index.php

My basic point was... thearpy will be useless if he is lieing uncontrolably.. because he will just lie about anything if they ask him.. if they ask him for instance "Are you afraid of social situations" even if he is, if he wasn't he would still probably lie yes. So any diagnosis they gave him would be based on lies.. ya know? You can't diagnos someone unless they tell you the truth, so unless he can give complete truths to this therapists, which it sounds as if he has an extreamly hard time doing to anyone face-to-face, then a lie dector could solve that problem.

just a suggestion..

Again, I don't agree. You really need to go behind the surface here. If a person is looking for help, looking for therapy on his or her own initiation it means that s/he has understood that there's something wrong and wants to change. That person realizes the lying is a problem that needs to be corrected and seeks out help. And either the therapist helps the patient to realize or the patient himself realizes that there can only be success if all the sessions are carried out with no lies. Otherwise the patient will remain in his miserable shell. So, the patient has a choice to make - either lie and stay miserable or try and be honest and get well... and so the patient is going to try to be honest. Otherwise the patient wouldn't be in therapy in the first place! No offence, but your point of view is superficial and can only be true if a patient is forced into therapy.

Also, the therapist is absolutely going to take everything the patient says with a grain of salt (because he know's the patient's problem).