Jealousy - Bad News or Just What the Doctor Ordered?
What is Jealousy?
There appear to be two types of jealousy - romantic and possessive. Romantic jealousy is triggered when you experience the unpleasant suspicion that your man or woman is being or may be unfaithful. When other people demonstrate by their admiration how attractive your partner is, you feel it should be a compliment; but you may also suspect the presence of a rival and fear losing out.
The green-eyed romantic jealousy monster is scary and we’ve all experienced its stomach churning power at some point in our lives. Taking the logical approach, we “discuss” our fear and anxiety with friends. We may maturely ask our partner for more attention or verbally express our anxiety about the relationship. We may also choose pride and refuse to allow ourselves to “feel stupid” over feelings of jealousy.
Possessive jealousy is the stuff of murder/suicides. This type of jealousy is controlling, angry and absolutely frightening. Our experience with possessive jealousy may include stalking, being cussed and screamed at, and unwarranted suspicion about everything you do or say. Your partner feels ownership of your body, heart, mind and soul, and demands complete loyalty and obedience. He or she manipulates things to control your behavior and thus feel more secure.
Conventional literature ties jealousy to low self-esteem. Some psychologists describe it as a paranoid distrust of others or ones partner. There is nothing inherently unnatural about feeling jealous, but crazy jealousy can interfere with and even destroy your relationships.
Crazy jealousy tends to develop along one of the following patterns:
- Those of you that are obsessed with your loved one;
- Those of you who constantly suspect a partner of being unfaithful with no supporting evidence; or
- Those of you who totally overreact to the slightest incident involving the opposite sex and your mate.
There are some of you that LIKE your partner to exhibit jealousy however. I’ve come across many men and women that are flattered if their partner exhibits signs of jealousy. You may do things to set your partner up to intentionally make them jealous. You then sit back and gauge their reaction as a measuring stick of their love for you.
This is a dangerous game that can often backfire. You may end up feeling silly or rejected when you don’t get the reaction you wanted. For instance, instead of a jealous reaction that brings you warmth you instead get an icy stare from your partner as he or she exits the room and sometimes the relationship!
Unchecked jealousy is one of the leading causes of domestic violence and murder around the world. Jealousy is NOT fun, and even in its lightest form causes feelings of anger and frustration in your relationship. Don’t play with your partners feelings by intentionally making him or her feel insecure and jealous. And for those of you that are jealous about everything remember this: repeatedly behaving in an out of control fashion will destroy the trust and comfort of your partner. Your jealousy will quickly erode your relationship.
Hopefully this article will help you do some serious thinking about why you feel insecure about your relationship, or why you lash out at your partner with accusations of cheating that you know have no basis in fact. Love cannot exist simultaneously in an environment of distrust. Those of you that behave in a jealous, controlling way in an effort to maintain your relationship will most likely bring about the very thing you are most afraid of — losing your lover or spouse.
(c) 2008 Deborrah Cooper. Deborrah has been involved in the relationships field for close to 20 years. She’s authored dozens of relationship articles and writes a weekly advice column using the pen name “Ms. HeartBeat.” Her works appear on the website AskHeartBeat.Com, which focuses on modern dating issues and relationships for both teens and adults. Her book: Sucka Free Love - How to Avoid Dating The Dumb, The Deceitful, The Dastardly, The Dysfunctional and The Deranged! provides witty, street-smart and hilarious insight into the toughest issues facing singles today.