** Re: Lying

firstly i had better explain my own,and my country's background.i'm from a traditional buddhist country where generally women are expected to be virgins till marriage and dating is not a "done" thing.i myself am from a conservative high class family and am a 20 year old single girl.my parents are together and we're a close family.i have one sister who is 10 years younger than i.

since a small child,i have been attention craving in a subtle way.what i mean is, i was never a loud child,nor do i dress or behave indecently.my problem is,i lie. when i was small the lies consisted of,for example,telling my parents that my class teacher said i'm the sweetest student in class etc.but it did not end there.as i grew,my habit got worse.now i lie about everything.i don't seem to be able to stop myself.to put it plainly,i can't resist creating drama in my life.

since leaving my childhood,i have lied mostly about guys.as i said before,my country is conservative and it is common to find 20 year old girls and boys who have never in their lives even once been romantically involved with anyone.people in our country start a relaionship almost always with marriage in their minds.i am no exception.therefore there are several criteria that must be fulfilled by a boy for me to consider him as a potential husband and to decide whether or not to get into a relationship(my parents would not object me having an affair if the person is compatible):he must from the same race and religion,must be a non-drinker,non-smoker,must have a good moral character and must be from a family of a compatible social class.

there have been several people who have been slightly interested in me for short term flings but naturally i have ignored them.however,no one upto now has professed to be deeply in love with me.i suspect that it is my craving for a man to be desperately in love with me and madly possessive that has worsened my lying over the years.for example,when i was 12 i started a story about a 14 year old guy who,i told my parents and friends,was stalking me,and i have continued that story for 8 years now by putting valentine's letters and presents into our letterbox myself and making up stories about phone calls where i claimed he begged for my love.i described him as a drop dead gorgeous perfect man that any girl would fall for if not for one problem:that he was an alcoholic.this was the reason i gave my friends for not reciprocating his feelings.in actual reality,this person never existed.it was total make believe on my part.

there have been a countless number of similar stories i have made up about guys falling madly in love with me ,fighting over me etc.even though the compulsive lying problemwas there all along,i think it has worsened due to this craving of actually wanting to meet a guy who would love me as my dream man did in fantasies.

my despair,i thinkis due to not being able to understand WHY men don't fall in love with me like that.i'm considered to be an extremely beautiful and sexy girl.i'm currently a full time student for a professional course and have achieved excellent results upto now.i'm highly talented and i'm also a warm hearted individual who genuinely cares about the people around.i'm well loved by all my friends and relatives.in fact, many of my male friends have told me that my future boyfriend is going to be "one lucky guy".so my problem is WHY don't any of them want to BE that lucky man!!

i see so many guys dying after girls who are far less attractive than i.fine,even if one does put looks aside,and takes ONLY personality into account,like i said before,everyone i know considers me to be a one in a million girl.

i do apologise for making this letter so long but i wanted to give you a clear picture of myself and my background since it is alien to you.my basic problem is,how can i stop this lying? it's beyond my control and my whole life seems to be made up of a web of lies in which i seem to be getting further and further entangled in.thank you.