How do you cope with jealousy issues?

[HollzHeartsChris]

Now, I'll admit. I feel a bit stupid for posting this because I never used to be like this with anyone haha. But since I met my SO, I've become a little envious of anyone giving him a hug or any other form of physical touch. I understand we all need friends of the opposite gender, and it really doesn't bother me my SO has female friends. Really. I encourage it, in fact, because I think guys should have at least one girl friend 'cause it forms a great friendship in most cases. He has one close female friend called Christina and he's told me she's a very nice girl. She does tend to hug him in a friendly way, and this is what bothers me. The only reason I get envious is 'cause she's the one hugging him and I'm not. There's nothing going between them: he's strictly told her to not try anything, and she agreed and knows that he has me. They're only friends. I've joked warningly that I'll have to come over there and sort them both out if that's the case (I didn't really mean it like that, but he knows what I'm getting at). I also trust him 100% so I have no doubts about his word. I trust him and he trusts me too. He's told me many times that he would never leave me for anyone, and I would never do that either. His words reassured me and they still do now.

Now, I don't have many guy friends. I'll be honest. 'Cause the majority of people on my university course are ladies and there's only 3 guys (poor guys ). I'm not really friends with any of them, although I've spoken to them before and they are friendly My question to you guys is this: how many of you have a similar situation to this? Do you get envious at all?

And if so, how do you deal with your envy?

[Fyrestar]

My SO has a personal assistant who is female and lives in the same house. She is beautiful.. but is like a sister to him. His ex wife and my SO have tea and raise their son together on the same page - she's a model. He has a fan club that would drive me crazy if I actually thought about all the 18 yr old somethings with the perfect bodies that would die to be anywhere close to physical contact.. or the videos that have to be made to promote his music - and all the women in them.

In the end, it's trust. I love him dearly. I know him better than another soul on this planet with his personal assistant being a close second - and there are things I know that she does not. I also know... he wants me. Me- the 37 yr old mother of two 17/18 - one living with his father right now and the other has moved out of the house. I am not a small woman lol ... I'm curvy - and around a 16/18. His culture - being Japanese.. well they are mainly tiny. If I didn't believe in his trust and faith to me, I could easily send our relationship to the toilet. But I know how I feel.. and I know how he feels.. and that - that my dear, is your answer. Faith. Have faith in him, yourself, and his feelings for you. Oh yes, I wish I could kiss him Good Night or Good Morning.. but I know that anything intimate is reserved for me.

And that makes all the difference in the world... I know he only has eyes for me.. and it isn't an exterior thing although he tells me I'm beautiful often, it's an interior thing - it's what is inside....

I am not sure if this helps at all, but ... hopefully you can find something useful in my post - it isn't overly easy baring one's soul with some of the worst fears any one in a LDR has.

[kiara_silver]

I get jealous with little things sometimes, I admit it. He doesn't have many female friends, but he hangs out every now and then with a few. When he goes out clubbing or such. I trust him an no so it doesn't bother me. and right now I want him to go out more and have fun. But I think if he did have someone hugging on him or touchy affectionate that I would get jealous. I been jealous in the past.... And I told him all about my silly worries and we talked it through and he reasured me and made mefeel better. Lol poor him, he has to deal with my jealousy sometimes or worries like that. But in the end its petty little things that I get over easy.

[nicole]

I do get jealous, not in a "I think there's something going on" way, just in a way where I think the other person, be it Man, Woman, Octopus etc is so lucky to hang out with him when I can't.

There's nothing I can do. We are how we are. I can't keep him under lock and key just because I miss him that bit more when he's hanging with someone else. Maybe if he had affectionate girl friends it would bug me more- he doesn't so I just have to deal with his friends taking up "our" time, which I usually just deal with and suck it up, as it doesn't happen often.

He gets jealous too, there was a hilarious time when I started going swimming with my friend Ben, who is most absolutely fabulously GAY, and I HAD told my SO this, but obviously he switched to "Other guy. Seeing MY girlfriend. In Bikini" mode and got all haughy. He'd go all quiet everytime I went swimming, until I mentioned Ben had got the number of the cute barman in the SU, and my SO was like "WAIT WHAAAAT?" and it finally clicked haha

I do think a little jealousy is healthy- it is a sort of way you know the other person cares when they get a bit possessive. It's just realizing you can't let the jealousy rule your relationship- if you're banning your SO from seeing certain people for example, it's time to take a step back and re-evaluate the situation, because something is going wrong somewhere.

[kteire]

I get jealous from time to time... it's rare, but it does happen. I tend to get jealous of people like my SO's flatmates (who are both male lol) because they get to spend time with him, and I don't! I have gotten jealous about one particular girl a few times, and we always find it helps for us to talk about it when it happens. I know it's completely 100% in my head, and talking to him about it makes me feel a lot better. I always figure that communication and honesty make things a lot easier, so I'd recommend talking it out with him! I have a lot of male friends that I'm very huggy with, and my SO has a lot of female friends (including the one I've been jealous of) who are also very huggy... so we've just kind of gotten used to it with time

[HollzHeartsChris]

I always figure that communication and honesty make things a lot easier, so I'd recommend talking it out with him!

Yeah, I've found talking to him about it helps too We were actually laughing about it yesterday. He gets the occasional bout of envy too, so it works both ways, but we know it's not massive or anything. Just a silly little bout that's laugh worthy xD

[Zephii]

I have a very close male friend. We hug. Obi has trouble not being jealous of this male friend, but they are nice to each other and they get along. I don't tell Obi that we hug hello or goodbye. I've done it with him around so he can assume I do it when he's not around. I don't bring it up because I know he doesn't want to think to much on it. He trusts me, and I go out of my way to not give him a reason not to trust me.

But, when people casually touch Obi, lookout. I have told him before "You're mine. Other people do not touch you." And I mean it. That's the price of admission to be with me Hugs I don't so much care about, I hug everyone so I don't think him hugging people is weird - its other random casual touching, like that backrub from a work mate or the friend who wants to snuggle while the movie is playing.
Sometimes it happens. I don't really want to know that it happened lol.

I don't have to do anything to cope with my jealousy, Obi does it for me most of the time. I don't get jealous of him spending time with others - because he makes time to spend with me too. He also tells me things that make me realise in his mind no one can compete with me.

[Dziubka]

I guess I think too highly of myself to be really jealous.

There was one istance when I sort of get jealous. My boyfriend's trying to learn my language and through his language institute he found a tandem partner to practice with. The first time he met here, was actually while I was visiting. I'll admit it. I was jealous and I was being a mean cow about it. I figured if I'm visiting, he should be spending time with me and then this tandem partner turned out to be a really young (cute!) girl. And then after their first meeting... we had a missunderstanding. In my jealous-mean-cow mind I understood him saying "She's really cute", it was only much (much!) later, that we talked about it and it turned out he had actually said "She's really young!". I was being so silly about it.
And ... yet... instead of being pissed off and telling me to come to my senses, he bought me a bouqet of white tulips when he realized how upset I was about all of that <3

And really now I'm glad he's doing such an effort to learn my language. I'm really not a good partner to practise with, because I have the patience of a 3-yr-old (none!) and I laugh at basically everything he says in my language. But since I'm secretly convinced that everyone who hears him speak my language MUST fall in love with him (it's so effing cute! His German teachers absolutely must be smitten!) it's still sometimes hard for me.

[Malaga]

I hardly do. I'm plagued by all sorts of insecurities and they make me jealous of anything and anyone who I perceive as stealing his attention from me. I'm aware of how freaky that is and I can control it to a point that I don't take it out on him (or anyone else). I support him to do what I know is right, even when it goes against my insecurities. It's a constant battle I'm having with myself, I have to keep my mind in check whenever it starts blowing things out of proportions. But it is getting better with time. His consistency and trustworthiness come along way in helping me to get over these issues.

I absolutely trust him not to cheat (this is the guy who met his favourite rock star in a pub and spent 10 minutes telling him over a pint that he should be faithful to his wife), but I worry that he might meet someone better for him and fall out of love with me.

I'm super happy and relieved he doesn't have female friends (other than his mates' wives and girlfriends but they don't count) because I know I would feel troubled by girls being close to him. I do even get jealous of his male friends sometimes, when I feel like they're 'stealing' what I feel should be my time with him. I'm a possessive monster and it's a constant inner drama.

[kat4301]

Well there's nothing quite like LDR that brings out the jealousy. I, too, never was half as jealous as I get now. One way I cope with it is by asking my SO to sorta "recreate" times that I miss when I do get to see him. Sure we miss lots of one time things, but I got jealous last weekend when I missed a night out on the town when my SO was out with friends including other girls (who were drunk, ugggg). So I asked if we could do something similar when I came to town, and he was more than happy to try it. This, at least kinda, makes me feel like I am part of the every weekend happenings, even though I am not and I get to know the people who I am jealous of, which can help somewhat. And, then I also get the opportunity (as shallow as it sounds) to stake my claim, so people know that I am an important part of his life. Which, if nothing else, at least makes me feel better.

[Dauntedpoet]

I have never had a jealous bone in my body.. UNTIL I met my SO. It was a nightmare for me to even figure out why I was angry because I didn't recognize what it was. I was in love with him but we were just friends so I had no right to be jealous so I couldn't even talk to him about it. In the Summer of 2007 after 9 years of biting my tongue, ignoring it, and telling myself I had no right... I LOST MY MIND in front of him. I was furious to the point of tears. We were in front of this woman friend of his that I didn't know and hadn't known he was going to have meet up with us. I asked to speak to him outside as I was shaking with anger and pain. I told him he should go home with his 'friend' and stay with her because I was done. He looked shocked and tried to touch my arm.. and I backed away from him crying. Every time he took a step toward me I backed away. I was racked by sob's and the look on his face was one of horror. Then he said... "Please" and tried to hold me and I backed away again. He said, "please, please let me hold you", and started crying. He does NOT show emotion, so to see him crying totally shocked me. And he wrapped his arms around me. We stood in the hallway holding each other crying and he kept saying he was sorry even though he had no idea what he'd done. It wasn't possible for us to talk about it right then as he had company and I had family in the other room... so we agreed to talk about when everyone was gone.

Basically I still can't believe how jealous I can feel over him. After that first time talking about it, all the guilt over feeling the jealousy went away. We both joke over how I don't share him well. He's admitted he is jealous on occasion but he hides it better than I do. Talking about it openly and honestly is why our relationship works. I reassure him, and he reassures me.