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El Kaz, I'm like you in that honesty is a (or even The) central virtue for me; perhaps just because it's one of the few I'm actually good at. Even so, I'm divided about whether or not to tell mom about the pending divorce. It's cases like this that just plain call for what Aristotle called 'practical wisdom'; you can't make general laws about ethics, because it's just too damn complex. So you need to just be familiar with what a virtuous life looks like, and navigate your way by feel and intuition at least as much as by cold logic.
As a side note, Kant is actually infamous for not allowing *any* exceptions to the 'do not lie' rule. Most neo-Kantians these days (who generally aren't very much like Kant anyway) water this down a bit.
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"Die Deutschen meinen, daß die Kraft sich in Härte und Grausamkeit offenbaren müsse, sie unterwerfen sich dann gerne und mit Bewunderung:[...]. Daß es Kraft giebt in der Milde und Stille, das glauben sie nicht leicht."
"The Germans believe that power must reveal itself in hardness and cruelty and then submit themselves gladly and with admiration[...]. They do not believe readily that there is power in meekness and calm."
-- Friedrich Nietzsche
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