Thanks for the responses, Heartsick. It does fit with wat I thought - she IS bad at lying and the majority of her lies are "normal" ones, also simple ones. Nothing complex is invented (probably because hse is bad at lying and can't invent a really effective lie).
I hear you about not being able to separate work and home. The example I gave of easy child 2/difficult child 2 shouting at me with hands on hips - at the time I was working as a counsellor (over the phone fmor home) and one particular client rang me often several times a day and was VERY unstable; I would hear the same tone of voice from her and then get off the phone to hear it again from my baby; I had to finally hand off the client and tell her I couldn't take her calls any more. I finally began screening my calls and the organisation I worked for (which normally wouldn't allow this) fully endorsed these steps in my case. Not because easy child 2/difficult child 2 was a problem - at the time we hadn't recognised any difficult child-ness. But because the client was causing me so much stress.
So I'm wondering - your job sounds stressful, maybe more at some times than others, and this stress is coming home with you and hacing a negative impact on your relationships within the household.
That's not to say you haven't also got a difficult child - but it's an odd thing, if the parent is stressed then often an otherwise socially unresponsive difficult child will 'pick up' on parental stress because it makes the child MORE anxious and this in turn makes their behaviour worse. You then get a downward negative spiral, a vicious circle.
To break that circle, the first thing you need is space. Even if it's only for an hour or so. Learn to walk away, walk right out of the house if you need to and go outside for a breath of fresh air. Use this time to mentally assess your own stress levels and where that stress is coming from. It won't all be work; it won't all be home. KNowing yourself makes it easier to deal with what you DON'T know. (You do sound a lot like me, in how your mind works - I'm a very mentally organised, pragmatic person).
The next thing you need is to get inside your kid's head. Don't let the lies be your focus - as has been said, they are a symptom. Your child lies because she is afraid of the consequences, she did the wrong thing because she didn't think and now she fears punishment. She gets anxious when she lies because she knows she is bad at it and will get caught, so it doesn't matter how you deal with this, simply discovering she is lying causes her to get upset and angry. Please be aware - a lot of her anger, however it is expressed, is directed towards herself.
Which brings me to self-esteem. hers is probably rock-bottom. Yours isn't good right now, either, because you're used to coping. So you BOTH need to turn this around. The best thing I can suggest, is to find something she likes to do that you can join in with. Keep it to very short sessions to begin with because it MUST begin and end on a positive note. At first just do this for no reason, "just because". You both need to see each other in a favourable, happy light. This should reduce the hostility that is forming almost instantly when either one of you interacts with the other.
Similarly, if you can set up situations where the sisters can play together in the same way, that would be good.
But with your girls - make quality times with each, individually. Try to keep that child your whole focus for that time.
It need only be five minutes, ten minutes, even half an hour. But not so long that either of you finds it tedious.
The sort of things you can do - go for a walk together. Play a computer game together (difficult child 3 recommends "Mario Party" games. So do I). Read a book to them (difficult child 3 likes to read the dialogue, putting on different character voices - but only because that is what I used to do). Bake a cake together, or decorate cupcakes. Or if you haven't got time/energy/talent to bake, decorate marshmallows as if they're cupcakes!
Ask each girl what they would like to do, let them set the pace.
We cannot diagnose on this board. Even if I were a fully qualified neuropsychologist with decades of experience, I wouldn't be able to tell you what your daughter has. However, purely as a parent, I will say - nothing you have said so far leads me to rule out Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD). There are still other possibilities. But Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) in some form, possibly Asperger's Syndrome, would in my book be a fairly high priority for consideration. For more thoughts on this, and for you to do a bit of study on your own, go to
www.childbrain.com and look for their online Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) questionnaire. It also cannot be used to diagnose, but you CAN print out the results (even if they score her as normal) and take them to an appointment for her, to let the doctor see where your concerns are running.
This possibility is not necessarily bad news, either. Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) kids tend to be highly intelligent. Also VERY law-abiding. The only problem here is that it tends to be the laws as THEY analyse them to be. For example, the school rule for difficult child 3 was "Do not hit other students."
But in his experience, other kids hit him all the time and the teachers did nothing. But if difficult child 3 hit back, he either was seen by a teacher or the other kids told the teacher and difficult child 3 got into trouble. yet if he told the teacher that another kid had hit him, the teachers did nothing.
So the rules, in difficult child 3's mind, became, "difficult child 3 may not hit other students because he will get into trouble. But other students may hit difficult child 3, unless there is a teacher actually watching."
The rule then morphed into "difficult child 3 gets hit because he is not a good person. Therefore difficult child 3 deserves to be hit and punished, purely because he is who he is. difficult child 3 has to just live with this, retaliation will be punished."
So you see that being law-abiding is still more complex. But once achild is into a routine and has taken the rules to heart, you will find a deeper honesty about that individual, despite an early history of the sort of lies you describe.
In our home - our kids finally stopped lying (so much) because they realised:
1) They are bad at lying, they WILL get caught out.
2) There is no problem about speaking the truth; if they did the wrong thing but are truthful about it, they will not be punished. However, they will have to help fix what they did wrong - but tat goes for all the time anyway, because if there is a mess someone always has to clean it up. Better it should be the person who made the mess.
3) It feels better to speak the truth. even a small lie makes the child feel really awful and the feeling is a natural deterrent. USe this, build on it. If you catch your child out lying and she rages, wait until she calms down then give her a hug (if you can) or in some way reassure her that you still love her (not easy right now!) and say, "You felt awful when you lied. You aren't good at lying, it makes you feel bad. I don't like it when you feel bad, it makes me sad for you. I do understand you forget to do the right thing sometimes - we all forget sometimes. It's OK to admit if you forgot to rinse the plates, or you lied about pushing your sister. Sisters (and brothers) do push and shove at times even though parents don't like it. But although it's the pushing I don't like, that doesn't mean I don't like YOU."
Keep reinforcing that you love her, that if she lies you WILL know but if she tells the truth you will just move on. She is lying because she is anxious and afraid, but it's a double-whammy because lying increases her anxiety. In time, with support (not easy) she should learn that telling the truth is the easiest path, that it feels better.
There is so much more, and a lot of it is good stuff. However, I don't wnat to overwhelm you right now.
Marg