Dishonesty can turn any family dynamic sour, especially when one family member seems to play fast and loose with the truth.

One mother grows increasingly angry with her daughter-in-law’s relentless dishonesty.

But when she calls her out, she unwittingly unleashes a rift big enough to change the family forever.

Read on for the full scoop.

I (56F) have a son and things have been tense because of his wife, “Emily” (28F).

I’ve noticed over the past year that Emily tends to stretch the truth or flat-out lie about things, both big and small.

She gives an example of Emily’s deceitful behavior.

At first, it was little things like saying she couldn’t come to family dinners because of work, only to post on social media that she was out with friends.

Then it escalated to bigger things.

We were both supposed to attend a charity fundraiser.

I was there the entire evening and never saw her.

Emily would always have an excuse, but it was always exceedingly easy to see through.

When I later asked if she had made it, she insisted that she had been there the whole time and even said she saw me but was too busy to come say hi.

This wasn’t true — I know for a fact she wasn’t there.

The volunteer’s list was small and I definitely would have seen her.

We were all in the same room.

Then, her deceit started to hit closer to home.

More recently, she lied about something involving a family event.

We were planning a small gathering for my husband’s birthday, and Emily told me she’d arranged a cake from his favorite bakery.

Again, Emily came up with a convenient excuse.

The day of the party, she showed up empty-handed, claiming they “lost the order.”

When I called the bakery to see what happened, they had no record of any order ever being placed.

That was the last straw for me.

She had no choice but to call Emily out.

I pulled her aside later and confronted her about her constant lying.

I tried to be calm and respectful, but I told her that her dishonesty was starting to affect how I viewed her and that it was creating tension in the family.

After all, she had literally messed up my husband birthday with these lies.

Emily only doubled down on her dishonesty.

She completely denied it and got really upset, saying I was making her out to be a bad person and that I was overreacting.

My son got involved and is now angry with me.

The confrontation only led to more chaos.

The whole thing has caused a rift, and now Emily refuses to come to any family gatherings unless I apologize.

I feel like I had every right to call her out, and I have nothing to apologize for.

The mother is left with a choice between apology and authenticity.

Redditors chime in with their two cents.

If her son is unwilling to see his wife’s dishonesty for what it is, the mother has a tough choice to make.

It’s clear to this commenter that the daughter-in-law’s excuses don’t hold any weight.

This redditor suspects their may be a deeper cause for the daughter-in-law’s dishonesty.

If unreliable is just how Emily is, moving forward, the mother may just need to adjust her expectations.

Emily’s web of deceit has spun the family into a tangled mess of distrust.

You can’t build a relationship on a foundation of lies.

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