Lips Don't Lie? Learn how to spot deception in words
Lips Don't Lie? Learn how to spot deception in words
You can uncover a lot
If you’re a regular reader, then you’ll know that I often say the word “just” is a big indicator of deception. I recently found a story where the person talking used the word “just” more than I had seen for a long time.
However, “just” is only an indicator of deception. When you see it used, then it is a signal to look into the words surrounding and see what else you can notice. So, let’s dig into those words and see what deception we can find.
Bear in mind as we go through this, not all deception is malicious. It could be caused by a lack of confidence, a desire to keep sensitive things hidden. It could even come from people who are deceiving themselves.
I’ll go through the words, looking only for deception.
Let’s break it down
My top lip was massive, it was triple the size it normally is. My skin was so tight on my lip I thought it was going to burst, it was awful. I looked horrendous, I looked like a completely different person, it was just huge. I looked like I'd been punched.
Each point made here is fairly straightforward. There aren’t too many unneeded words. Normally, this would be an indication of truthfulness.
However, this paragraph contains numerous ways of saying the same things. It’s repetition of a thought.
This paragraph says, “my lip was very swollen and looked bad”. Repeating that over and over is to increase our perception of the severity. They want to persuade us that it was extremely swollen and terrible looking. The words used don’t say that, though.
Truthful people generally don’t feel the need to persuade us of their truth.
It was embarrassing too, I felt like hiding away from people. I was essentially left with a 'duck' lip.
I believe it was embarrassing. She delivers that part in a straightforward way.
The next part backs up the observation that the first description may not be true. She only “felt” like hiding away, she only “essentially” was left with a duck lip.
Another way of putting that is it wasn’t so bad she had to hide away, and it was somewhat like a duck lip but not really.
We’re two paragraphs in and there are now solid indicators that the truth is being embellished here.
More and more
I've had lip filler done by her before, the first time I had 0.5ml sometime early last year and then had them done a second time in December.
This is heading off some criticism that she feels is due to come with this account of what happened. This isn’t necessarily deception, but it is something to note.
I loved it the first time, that's why I went back for more. Once the swelling goes down you want more. The first time I only had half a ml and it was absolutely fine but this time I wanted a full ml - but she didn't put anywhere near that in.
The first thing I noted here was that her second visit for lip fillers has disappeared, only the first and last times get mentioned.
The last sentence has two “but”s in it. Whatever comes after the “but” is most important to the person talking—in this case, the priority is the amount of filler that was not injected into her lip, followed by how much filler she wanted this time.
We can tell from this that the amount of filler is significant to her and potentially a sensitive subject. This is backed up from her use of the word “more” twice.
Finally, she uses “I” to show ownership of most of these words, but she says “you” want more after the swelling goes, not “I wanted more”. Both the pronoun and the tense have changed.
Just in time
It all just seemed a bit weird and dodgy from the start, to be honest, she made me put my own numbing cream on in the car, and then I had to wait for 10 minutes.
Here’s the first “just”! And right after that “just” is a very vague phrase “just seemed a bit weird and dodgy”. “Seemed” and “a bit” do nothing to strengthen the sentence. Why not say “it was weird and dodgy”? I’d suggest she didn’t say it because it wasn’t weird and dodgy, but she wants to give that impression.
She only inserted the needle into my skin twice. When she was pushing the filler in it absolutely killed, it was like I'd just been stung by a wasp.
“Absolutely” is another word which indicates deception taking place and this is a perfect example. If it “absolutely killed” and we took the phrase literally, she’d be dead. She wants to say it was really sore, but she goes overboard with “absolutely killed” and then brings it down to it feeling like being “stung by a wasp”.
Pain game
I said to her 'I don't know what it is that's different but I can't stand that pain'. It was awful, my eyes were streaming. I couldn't cope anymore so I told her to stop - so basically she still had a full ml of the filler in there.
There are two “so”s in the last sentence, an indication that story-telling is taking place. This part is very focussed on the pain that she “can’t stand”, “was awful”, caused her eyes to stream, and she couldn’t “cope anymore” with it. However, she finishes that litany of pain by mentioning the amount of filler unused. Is the amount of unused filler a more important lasting memory to her than the pain?
It appears so, yes.
The story-telling here is all building up to show the reason there is filler left unused. She says there was “basically” “a full ml” left over. “Basically” denotes there wasn’t exactly a full millilitre left, but she wants us to have the impression there was.
She said she could get me some numbing stuff that would make my mouth completely numb but that it would be another £10. She said she would save it and that once she'd ordered the numbing cream we could use it then.
There is a “but” here. What comes after the “but” is important to the person. Here it is the extra money.
I’m also interested in why she says they could use the new cream once it had been “ordered”, rather than when it arrived. I’d expect to hear “once she had the new cream we could use it then”.
Honestly
I did think about the fact that the needle was just left but to be honest I just wanted to get out because it was too painful. I've never experienced that kind of pain in my lips before.
People who say “honestly” and “to be honest” set my deception alerts off. Why does she now feel the need to tell us she is going “to be honest”?
READ MORE: The words that reveal you’re being lied to
Once again, we’re getting repeated mentions of the pain. It’s critical for her to get across the pain. However, she qualifies it by saying it’s only a severity of pain she’s never experienced “in my lips” before.
I don’t find her description of the pain consistent. At this point, I’m happy to say that she is being deceptive about the amount of pain.
I woke up just thinking 'I want to look at my face straight away' and when I saw that I thought 'oh my god’. I work in a nursing home where there are nurses, luckily we had to wear masks. It was the only time I was happy about wearing it.
And the pain has gone. She has spent a bit of time before this persuading us that hardly any filler was injected, so why did she want to see her face so badly? She doesn’t say.
And why does she say she wanted to look at her “face”? The procedure took place on her lips, that is also where she felt pain.
And what about her face made her say “oh my god”? She doesn’t say. She says, “when I saw that” but doesn’t say what “that” is.
Instead of telling us what could be the crux of the story, she jumps to telling us where she works and the profession of the people she works with.
It wasn't just swelling on my lip, the bottom of my nose was starting to swell as well. When I went to work my manager and the nurses said 'you need to go to A&E just in case you lose the oxygen in your lip, you could lose your top lip'.
Again, there is no mention of pain here, it is only swelling. Previously, she told us that she was happy to be wearing a mask to cover her lip, but has now shown her lip to her manager and multiple nurses.
People at my work were worried in case the swelling would go higher up into my eyes. I left work, I lost out on a day's work, and I took myself off to A&E.
Her previous medical advice came from a manager and nurses. Now it has come from “people”.
“I lost out on a day’s work” is not a phrase you hear much. Unless she was on work experience or is a workaholic, I’d suggest this is about her missing a day’s money.
Hospital case
While I was there I was receiving phone calls from the practitioner [saying she would] come and smash my face at the hospital. She was so angry, she was saying things like 'what do you expect me to do? It's just swelling, what do you want?'.
“Practitioner” is a very formal and neutral title to give someone who you feel has botched a procedure and caused you pain. Not to mention has allegedly threatened you.
She says the practitioner was “so angry” yet the only direct quote she gives of the practitioner’s words don’t sound too angry.
I’d like to know why the practitioner was calling her? It could be out of care or worry, or it could be to be aggressive and threatening. I question how did they know to call? It could be because the person telling the story has contacted them first to tell them of the pain and distress they are in.
She also said I was stupid for going to hospital and wanted to know which hospital I was at, she was being really aggressive about it.
There’s no pronoun before “wanted to know which hospital I was at”. It’s possible this didn’t happen.
REFUND
She also wasn't willing to give me any refund—bearing in mind I've not used that filler there was a full ml still in that syringe. All I kept asking her was 'can you give me your insurance details please?'.
For her to say that the practitioner “wasn’t willing to give me any refund” means she must have asked for a refund for her to know she “wasn’t willing”. And using “any refund” rather than “a refund” suggests that a conversation took place where she tried to negotiate a refund amount, unsuccessfully.
That’s twice now I feel that she has hidden the actions she took that would explain the actions of the practitioner. She’s being selective about what she is telling us, why is that?
The description of the millilitre of filler is interesting. She told us earlier some had been injected “when she was pushing the filler in” and said there was “basically” a millilitre left (i.e., less than a millilitre). Now she is saying “there was a full ml still in that syringe”. Those descriptions can’t all be true.
When she says, “all I kept asking” was for the insurance details, that means she asked repeatedly. That feels potentially aggressive to me.
Finally, here, she mentions wanting a refund and insurance details but doesn’t explicitly say why she feels she is entitled to a refund or to claim insurance.
She was just saying 'if you want insurance details then come to my door and get them' like in a threatening way. Obviously, she didn't want to do that, she refused to give me my money back and said if I put it anywhere that she was going to get me done for slander.
We see words weakening the point she is attempting to make once more—the words weren’t said threateningly, they were said “like in a threatening way” – that is, like a threat but not a threat.
There’s another dropped pronoun ahead of the slander line, “and said if I put it anywhere” rather than “and SHE said…”.
Given the description of the practitioner’s behaviour, we might think that the refusal to give a refund and the mention of slander is aggressive and threatening. However, they could also be the actions of someone who feels they have done nothing wrong and wants to protect their reputation.
She expects us to be convinced by her use of the word “obviously”. She is using it to strengthen her point and make sure it isn’t questioned because it’s “obvious”.
I was concerned with her saying what hospital are you at, I was worried she was going to come.I was more worried about my lip and what was going to happen to my face.
There’s a bit of distance in the way she says she “I was concerned with her saying what hospital are you at”. If she had said she “was concerned with her wanting to know which hospital I was at”, it would be more personal.
READ MORE: Pronouns from a killer
Happy doctors
The doctors pressed on it and it went from white to pink straight away so the circulation was still there, so they were happy about that.
More use of the word “so” indicates more story-telling going here. It’s not necessarily a fabricated story, but she is explaining things that happened, not just recounting events.
It is interesting that she says, “they were happy about that” not that she was happy there was still circulation in her lips.
They weren't really sure what had gone on because it was so swollen but they gave me some tablets to take and they said it would take the swelling down. I took them and within one or two days the swelling went down.
“Not really sure” is another way of saying that the doctors has some ideas or possibilities as to why the swelling had happened, but she’d rather keep these from us.
If this was the traumatic worry she claims it was, then I would expect her to know exactly how long it took the swelling to go down. “One or two days” is very vague. Why doesn’t she say “within a day” or “in a couple of days”? It could be because it wasn’t long at all, but she wants to avoid saying that.
Life goes on
I went back to work the day after that. I've not had any contact from her since and she's not given me any refund, I've just got on with my life.
There’s that word “just” again. And someone who is “just” getting on “with my life” doesn’t tend to give extensive interviews to a journalist.
I've not even thought about getting them done again but if I did I'd go to someone who's professional, who's got a shop, and is a proper, qualified nurse. I would never go to someone's house ever again that's put me off that.
If a lot of what we’re seen so far points towards deception and then here, we see factual deception. She says she “has not even thought” about having her lips done again, then proceeds to show that she has thought about it and will make changes she will make next time she does.
Conclusion
There is deception at play here. She is exaggerating the pain she felt, the embarrassment she felt, the amount of filler not used and the behaviour of the practitioner.
Why is she doing that? Read my next post. After going through the words and finding deception, we’ll go through them and uncover the truth.
While you’re waiting for that, you might also like these: