Jealousy is one of the worst love experiences that we are often ashamed of because it hides fears and disappointments. Let’s try to figure out what this feeling really means.
1. Where does jealousy come from?
According to psychoanalysis, jealousy originates in early childhood, and the moment when we experienced it most acutely leaves a mark on us for life. When we are jealous, we are actually re-living the old pain that we experienced as a child: after all, when we were weaned, we felt abandoned, betrayed.
According to the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, how we experienced this suffering, which was necessary to prevent a total merger with the mother, affects us in all love relationships. For some, it is a very big pain. No other love for such people will be strong enough, and not a single person is enough devoted and worthy.
2. Is it possible to be jealous and at the same time unfaithful?
This is about a common problem. Consider, as an example, the story of 42-year-old Gianni. Before marriage, he was a real ladies’ man, but later decided to “take up his mind” and got married. His wife is faithful, which confirms her behavior. However, Gianni seethes with jealousy when he sees her talking to other men.
“The husband attributes to his wife his desire to change,” says Edorado Giusti, director of a specialized psychotherapy school in Rome. “By dumping on her suspicions of infidelity and treason, he satisfies his sense of guilt.” This situation is an example of “projected jealousy” as defined by Sigmund Freud.
3. Is it true that women are more jealous than men?
No, but they show it more clearly. Women show curiosity in relation to the opponent, they want to know everything: hair color, clothing size, interests. Men, for the most part, either deny or do not recognize the existence of a rival, and remain indifferent for a long time.
“My husband always swore he wasn’t jealous of me,” says Clara, 36. And I think he really thought so. But that evening, when I told about one minor affair from the time when we already knew … He vomited all night.
4. When can jealousy be pathological?
Sigmund Freud stated that jealousy is a natural feeling. If it is not there, then it was hidden in the subconscious, from where it can arise again, and with difficult to control consequences. “Over the course of a lifetime, it is quite normal to experience one crisis of jealousy (or more),” explains psychologist and psychotherapist Anna Barracco.
We need to sound the alarm if jealousy becomes a permanent state in which we only think that our partner has betrayed us, to the point that we leave work early to come home and control him.
5. Jealousy and envy: what’s the difference?
Jealousy is the fear of losing what you have, while envy is the suffering that someone else has something that you would like to have. In addition, jealousy implies the presence of a third person, but envy implies a relationship between two people. We are talking about two related feelings: the word “jealousy” originally comes from the Greek word “zelos”, which translates as “envy”.
6. Which opponent scares you the most?
There are two types of rivals: “twin” and “opposite”. Marco, 39, twice accused his bride of cheating with men who were different from him: “Then it was easy hobbies and I didn’t feel threatened by them. But one day a man like me appeared in her life. And I got really sick.”
“Marco has a very strong narcissistic component,” emphasizes Edorado Giusti, “he is convinced that he is the best. Facing an opponent who is not only like him, but who may be better, plunges you into a crisis.”
Francesco, 46, is a completely different case: “I never got jealous of my wife for her ex until I read his letter, which was full of spelling errors. This discovery greatly shattered my self-esteem. If she loved such a man, how could she love me, a complete antipode? .. ”
“When the opponent is somehow “below” us, the disappointment becomes doubly stronger, comments Giusti. “Knowing that we are competing with a zero without a wand, we feel powerless, and because of this powerlessness, resentment and a lack of respect grow.”
7. Why is jealousy difficult to moderate?
For many, jealousy is proof of love. To stir up passion in this way is a common practice: an old trick to provoke sexual aggression by imagining that you are facing a rival.
“My husband staged scenes of jealousy from scratch,” says 41-year-old Maria. “I felt overwhelmed until it dawned on me that for him it was like an aphrodisiac.”
8. How to recover from jealousy?
“Everyone has a defense strategy,” says Anna Barracco, “some are defensively affective: they kill love in order to kill jealousy.” Some invent strange tricks – for example, 40-year-old Enrico literally threw his wife into the arms of another. “This person is trying to banish jealousy,” she continues, “by visualizing the enemy. That way he feels less threatened.”
However, there are less radical treatments, such as keeping a diary or notes. When you talk on paper (or on video) about suffering and feelings, it helps to overcome the crisis. You can go to therapy and learn how to manage jealousy. In general, since we cannot avoid this feeling, we can at least bypass the self-destruction caused by it.
9. How to stop suffering?
Edorado Giusti advises how to get rid of jealousy.
Retrospective jealousy
- Ignore the past. You will always find something to cling to. Now only you exist, and only this is truly important.
- Realize that each couple has a special unique magic. What a partner experiences with you is never experienced with anyone else.
Actual jealousy
- Think back to the beginning of the relationship. Look at your partner the way you would look then. Think about the fact that you are the only and irreplaceable for him.
- Don’t be afraid to face your opponent(s). Stop fantasizing, and look jealousy in the face, that is, on an object of flesh and blood. This will help you reduce or reorganize the feeling.
