How do you deal with jealousy?

[dwarven]

This is by far the worst emotion I've experienced. I love my girlfriend, and every indication shows that she loves me too. But I still get psychotically jealous whenever she talks to her male friends. I do a decent job of hiding the depth of my jealousy, because I don't want it to affect our relationship. I just can't sleep or do anything productive when I'm feeling this way. How do you all cope with it?

[Slavemaker]

A little jealousy is good for a relationship because it shows that you care for him/her and love him/her, a lot however can be harmful.

[Deleted]

Well, if you see a female friend of yours and you guys just talk or hang out, then you know your girlfriend has nothing to worry about. So you shouldn't worry as well.

[dwarven]

A little jealousy is good for a relationship because it shows that you care for him/her and love him/her, a lot however can be harmful.

True. I've just been hurt before, and that little bit of suspicion is always there now. It sucks, because she's amazing and deserves 100% of my trust.

[Clockwork Pinkie]

I feel the same but it ultimately just comes down to trusting the person you love. She will have friends that are guys just like we will have friends that are girls. It hurts sometimes and there is no clear way to deal with it, at least not in my eyes, as the sting will still be there. Kind of makes it so you can't do anything else while the feeling of jealously is in your head. It happens, it comes and goes. If it comes and goes too often though, there may be a problem you should talk to her about. It's good to ackowledge the person you love about a certain feeling like that, as the poster above you said, it shows that you care about this person, a lot. Chicks "dig" that.

[Elexo]

What exactly is making you jealous?
Are they flirty? Are her male friends overly nice to her? Does she go out with them without you?

[dwarven]

I feel the same but it ultimately just comes down to trusting the person you love. She will have friends that are guys just like we will have friends that are girls. It hurts sometimes and there is no clear way to deal with it, at least not in my eyes, as the sting will still be there. Kind of makes it so you can't do anything else while the feeling of jealously is in your head. It happens, it comes and goes. If it comes and goes too often though, there may be a problem you should talk to her about. It's good to ackowledge the person you love about a certain feeling like that, as the poster above you said, it shows that you care about this person, a lot. Chicks "dig" that.

Yea, I agree. It feels really good to just talk about it with people I've noticed.

---------- Post added 2012-03-26 at 02:23 AM ----------

What exactly is making you jealous?
Are they flirty? Are her male friends overly nice to her? Does she go out with them without you?

She's polite, but not flirty. I know a lot of single guys probably want to get with her, though. My personality has always prohibited me from hitting on girls who were taken, but I know there are other guys who would. She doesn't hang out with them much as far as I know.

[Windry]

1) If she's talking to her male friends without you (like online chat, or going out with a group of friends, or emailing them), and you trust her, try to stay occupied. Go out with your friends, play a video game you get really into, or watch that TV show/anime you've been looking forward to. Jealousy is at its worse when you're sitting there bored thinking about how much fun your partner is having without you. Find something engaging or entertaining during that time.

2) If she's hanging out with her male friends, and you're there too, and she does it a lot.... then you're just going to have to try really hard to be friends with them too. Find SOMETHING in common you can talk about. Sports/games/TV/Movies/Books/Music/Politics... something.

I would also say, you should let her know, gently. Example: "Hey sweetie, I'm glad you have good friends, and I hope you have fun tonight, but you've been spending a lot of time with them and I'm starting to get a liiiiiiittttttle bit jealous."

Lastly, you need to come to a very basic realization. Other men will tell her interesting stories and make her laugh. PERIOD. You do not own the monopoly on that no matter how much you love each other, and no matter how much you like making her smile.

[Deleted]

Jealousy, turning saints into the sea, swimming through sick lullabies, choking on your alibis, but it's just the price I pay, destiny is calling me, open up my eager eyes, 'cause I'm Mr Brightside.

If you are preoccupied with being jealous you will destroy your relationship anyway.

[Deleted]

Last time I was in a relationship, I got a little miffed at times when other guys were interacting with my girlfriend but never got too bothered by it. I've just always said to myself to try trust your 'partner' and if they cheat, hopefully it'll be exposed and you can say, "So what? If that's the kind of character they have, it's on them. Not you.". If you try your best to be a good boyfriend, give as much as you get and stay committed yourself, then any infidelity is a problem on their end, not yours and they ain't worth losing sleep over.

[Deleted]

Weed ...

No, on a more serious note, you don't, live with it and learn from it, jealousy is a good thing - reminds you that the person in question is important for you

And trust, do you trust your GF? If the answer is yes, you should be able to calm yourself down a bit

But talk with her, tell her how it makes you feel - might get a bit better then But for the love of god, do not, i repeat, do NOT try and command her to NOT talking with her male friends.

[Carnaby]

You just have to trust your girl. Never spy or snoop, because anything you find will most likely be taken out of context by you and cause you to flip for no reason.

Be sure to have open communication. It's better to talk to her about things than let them fester inside you. But realize that she has the right to have male friends.

It's hard. It really is with all the people out there that don't respect a relationship enough to not cheat on their partner it makes it hard to let your guard down. Just trust your gut. If you really, really suspect something is up, talk to her about it. Explain your side of things and why you feel the way you do. If she's not cheating on you she should understand, then go from there.

Good luck

[Army Dreamer]

Let's discuss you signature instead. Did you ever fly by plane or drive a car?

[Deleted]

It's never nice to think of your SO in a romantic connection with someone else, but it all boils down to whether or not you trust your girlfriend. If you trust her, you shouldn't need to feel jealousy. It doesn't matter what the other guys want or don't want to do, as long as she's faithful to you. Put your faith in her and realize that nothing is going to happen if she doesn't want it to. And if something does happen, well then she's not worth your time and you can move on.

[Brutes]

Become to most powerful man in the world. Only option to kill an emotion.

[Lynarii]

You beat an emotion not by fighting the emotion itself (you'll lose that battle, guaranteed) but by attacking the faulty thought processes that lead to the emotion. Do some soul-searching, really map out what exactly makes you feel jealous, why, and how reasonable the thoughts that take you down that path are. I will bet you that if you truly trust your girlfriend, you'll start uncovering things that range from bad logic to patently absurd theoreticals. If you need a little bit of help, there are resources that can give you a list of the most common examples of "stupid shit your brain does to try and justify something it knows is wrong". Learn to recognize when your thoughts are switching from reasonable thinking to batshittery, and find (and practice) methods of getting it back on track. If you can train your brain to not go down a path you know is wrong in the first place, you'll never reach the destination (which is the jealousy).

[lsmf5]

Its ok to be a bit jealous, it's perfectly normal, hell it's biological. However, if your getting so jealous your losing sleep over it, then you need to do something about it. You've pointed out that she's done nothing wrong so this jealousy is purely manifested by you.

It is fine to speak to someone about it, but do not ever tell your gf you are jealous, at all. No guy or girl wants a jealous gf or bf. At the same time, telling a gf that your jealous, you may as well just be giving away any power in that relationship, which is not a good thing.

It may be the case that you've been hurt before, but you need to put that in the past, otherwise you'll always get like this.

You haven't mentioned if you trust her, as if you trust her your less likely to feel jealous.

You say you love her and every indication says that she does too. Have you and her actually said 'I love you/too'.

[Torne]

I look in the mirror.

[Deleted]

Life gets much easier when you, so to speak, "stop giving a fuck". Then you don't obsess with love nor are you jealous about someone. You just kinda are with her and it goes freely.

[Kasierith]

Imagine how you would feel if she started going after you for talking to close female friends. Although, if you lack those (apart from her obviously) that might be the source of the problem in and of itself