"Are you serious?"???
Uhhhh...yeah. I mean, you asked why a teenager would make up a story like that and I had already pointed out he/she was taking medicine for bipolar disorder, so if figured that if you couldn't accept "plain crazy" as an excuse, a couple of more tried and TRUE excuses might satisfy you.
As far as Amanda goes, first, she said outright that she was looking for a "career" promoting calmares. Later on, when that "career" didn't materialize, THEN she said calmare didn't work for her.