I wouldn't have considered myself as a jealous person. I was in a five year relationship with a man who was extremely jealous and possessive and I suppose I always took this as a benchmark.
When I met my husband I was at the most comfortable and confident stage of my life emotionally. I was travelling and being away from familiarity and meeting new people, I was in my element. I had been single for quite a while and was very happy that way.
That was a year and a half ago. We got married four months ago. My husband can be jealous at times but we have gone to counselling. His behaviour has improved but I'm worried that this is due in part to the re-emergence of old insecurities.
I suppose when I was single, there was less chance of being hurt really badly by someone I loved. I would flirt though and enjoyed it, nothing serious, just fun and a lot of my confidence came from men responding positively to the flirting. I would never have flirted with men I knew were involved with people I knew. I would have flirted subtly when my husband was around but the kind of flirting everyone does. Because I knew therewas nothing meant by it, wasn’t and wouldn’t be any intent behind it I was upset that my husband would get annoyed. He would be quite an insecure person but I never gave him any reason to doubt me.
Since then however, my personality seems to have changed. I have become lost in the relationship because he can be very demanding. I don’t talk to men or others like I used to. I feel depressed and that my bubbly outgoing personality has been flattened. Even if I wanted to, I don’t think I could have a flirt. I don’t have any energy and I feel boring. I can’t concentrate on conversations and feel teary. I feel that I have no personality. I am not the woman that my husband fell in love with, who made him laugh and entertained him.
And there is the problem. To me, everybody else, women mainly seem to have great personalities. I find myself getting jealous of my husband speaking to my friends and I feel left out in groups. The jealousy has caused me to take it out on my husband which is making matters even worse. I have a particular paranoia about a colleague of mine who I was close to once. She has flirted with my previous boyfriends and is very sexy and fun and kind and generous; the list goes on. Because of the smoking ban in pubs, my husband and her end up spending quite some time together outside . They both smoke, I don’t. I resent being left inside though I am never on my own. I know if it were the other way around, that I was outside with my husbands friend, he would be extremely annoyed if we spent the same amount of time together as they do.
The flip side of the jealous and demanding nature of my husband is that he is very attentive, loving and passionate. But I know every other woman sees this and especially now more than ever, I feel that I could lose him. I don’t really believe anything is going on with my colleague but I feel very threatened and I know I could drive him away because of my insecurities. I want to get back to being me but I don’t know how.