When Partners Encourage Each Other To Lie

Of course, we all want our partners to be honest with us. But, at the same time, there may be some things we just don’t want to hear.

There’s a concept in the Developmental Model of Couple Therapy: “lie-inviting behavior.” What this means, basically, is that if you flip out when your partner tells you something uncomfortable, you’re sending them a message. Without meaning to, you’re saying “Next time, either don’t tell me at all, or don’t tell me the truth.”

Flipping out in any of its forms–yelling, crying, storming out, shutting down, name-calling–probably won’t stop your partner from doing or thinking the thing you don’t like. It will almost certainly stop them from bringing it up to you, however. That leaves you with a choice: would you rather do your best to withstand the discomfort in order to be able to hear the truth? Or would you rather push your partner to go underground, in exchange for feeling more comfortable?

If you want to truly know your partner, then you will need to be prepared to hear them talk about what is true for them, and what their perceptions, feelings, and desires are. If this is what you want, you will need to show your partner that you’re capable of handling hearing their truth. It’s your partner’s responsibility to be honest–but you can make that more likely by listening without judgement, holding steady through difficult emotions, and framing your responses as being about you, your feelings, beliefs, and the meanings you have learned to make. It’s particularly powerful if you can find it in yourself to thank your partner for telling you the truth even if it was hard for you to hear.

If you’ve been very upset in the past when your partner has told you a difficult truth, you may want to take the time to make a repair. You can go back to your partner and say, “I realize that my reaction to what you said may have made it hard for you to talk about this topic. I want you to know that, regardless of what I said in the heat of the moment, I appreciate that you trusted me enough to tell me the truth. I want you to be able to be honest with me, even about difficult topics, and next time I will do my best to take it in stride.”

If you’re a therapist, keep your eye out for lie-inviting behavior. Holding steady through a difficult conversation is a real differentiation-of-self challenge. I like to tell my clients that their efforts will be rewarded with the deeper intimacy that comes from truly knowing one another. Most of us want that, and being able to tolerate the discomfort of having differences is a big part of creating that closeness.