We Can't Learn by Covering Up a Mistake With a Lie

After having her 4 wisdom teeth removed this past week, Marisa was on antibiotics as a precaution against infection. She needed to take 4 pills a day which was difficult to work out considering her busy schedule. However, we kept a chart together, and each day we worked out a schedule for when her pills would be taken.

Yesterday was the last full day for her to take her antibiotics. Last night after returning from an evening social group, I reminded her to take one pill before bed and the last one the next morning. Unfortunately, I fell asleep in the den and did not remind Marisa to take her bedtime pill. When I woke up later in the evening, I checked her pill container and was disappointed to see that there were 2 pills left which meant she had forgotten to take the late evening dose.

This morning I looked in her pill container and saw that both pills were gone. "When did you take the 2 pills?" I asked. "Ohhh, I took one last night ... and one this morning!" she answered. "Well, how can that be?" I asked. "I saw two pills there late last night. You didn't take one last night." I realized that Marisa was afraid to tell the truth. She probably thought I would be angry at her. "Marisa, if you forgot, it's not that terrible, but at least tell me when you took the pills," I said. "I took the 2 pills this morning!" she cried out. "Okay, so it's better to tell the truth than to lie. We all make mistakes, and we all forget things sometimes. If you had asked me this morning, we could have come up with a solution for how to handle missing a dose."

Marisa learned that she had more to lose from not telling the truth than from telling the truth. "Always tell the truth," I said, "because you can learn from your mistakes but will never learn anything by covering up a mistake with a lie."