Romantic Jealousy: Causes, Symptoms, Cures (14 page)

Dean was convinced that every interaction he had with another woman was a jealousy-trigger for Melanie. Ile argued fervently that all the things he had done in the past were "insignificant and trivial" compared to his "complete honesty and truthfulness in the relationship now." To Melanie, however, it seemed that her suspicions were quite adequately justified by Dean's behavior in the past. The triggers of her jealousy were well defined; they included all situations involving women when there was even a slight chance that Dean was dishonest with her. Seeing Dean interact with an attractive woman and thinking that he might be attracted to the woman or even have an affair with her and lie about it were enough to make Melanie wild with jealousy.

When Dean and Melanie walked together, Dean occasionally would bump into a woman he knew and exchange a few words with her. He knew that this was enough to raise Melanie's suspicions. She would start asking questions about the woman and his acquaintance with her. Her interrogations made Dean more and more angry. Finally he refused to answer her questions. "1 know the way her mind works," he said, "and it drives me nuts."

The "scratches incident" was the final straw. Melanie noticed that Dean had scratches on his back, which he didn't remember getting; Melanie felt he couldn't possibly have caused the scratches himself. When she started to question him about the scratches, Dean felt "something explode" in his head. He says he didn't know what he was doing. He started to hit Melanie. The violence shocked and scared both of them and was the real reason they came for therapy.

In trying to figure out how both of them contributed to the dynamic of their jealousy problem, Melanie claimed that her main problem was lack of* trust in Dean. If Dean would swear to tell her the truth-even if he was attracted to another woman, even if he had a fling-she was sure she could handle it. But Dean refused to give his word. He saw Melanie's suspicions as groundless and found her interrogations intolerable. "I've had enough of this madness," he said. "Melanie has a problem, and she is the one who has to solve it." Since Dean and Melanie seemed stuck in their positions, I asked them to reverse roles, and explain to me each other's positions.9

Both had difficulty with the task. Melanie had a great deal of trouble expressing the extent of Dean's resentment and anger at her suspicion. Dean had problems expressing the extent of Melanie's hurt and distrust of him. It was as though Dean and Melanie had supersensitive antennae, he to signs of her jealousy, she to signs of his possible unfaithfulness. Once they both realized the extent of each other's sensitivity, they were able to focus their effort on "reducing the volume" of their respective responses.

Dean agreed to tell Melanie the truth about his romantic involvements, actual or possible, with other women. In exchange, Melanie promised to trust him, to stop being suspicious of every woman he interacted with, and to cease her interrogations of him. Though this solution may sound too simple to work, in this particular case it did. Melanie stopped being "a jealous person." When I last spoke to Dean and Melanie, two years after they made their agreement, they no longer had problems with jealousy. One reason the agreement worked was that they attempted to solve the problem together. Another reason was Melanie's willingness to put complete faith in Dean's word. Once he gave it, she was convinced he'd never lie to her.

']'his does not mean that every "jealous person" will stop being jealous the minute his or her mate promises to be honest about involvement with others. Other couples may need different solutions. The challenge in each case is to discover the solution that works.

Leading systems theorists Paul Watzlawick, John Weakland, and Richard Fisch (1974) give an example of the way a jealousy system is activated, maintained, and perpetuated: A wife feels excluded from her husband's life, so she starts questioning him. The husband feels that her questioning is an intrusion, so he withdraws. I lis withdrawal increases her anxiety and suspiciousness, so her efforts to "find out" become more persistent and more desperate. I ler jealousy and suspicion increase his resentment and cause him to withdraw and withhold even more. The husband and wife are caught in a no-win situation. The wife (in this case the jealous mate) realizes that questioning her husband will probably lead to angry withholding or forced reassurance that ultimately does not reassure her. The husband (in this case the nonjealous mate) realizes that withholding leads to further distrust and jealousy, yet is afraid that disclosing any information may exacerbate the problem (Watzlawick et al., 1974).

In other cases the husband may be the jealous mate and the wife the nonjealous mate. In gay couples, the less committed partner and the partner who has more outside options tend to be nonjealous. Mary and Sharon, whom I mentioned before, are an example.

In addition to the fact that Mary was more attractive and more elegant than Sharon, Mary was also very attached to her family of origin and her many male and female friends: Sharon was cut off from her family of origin, and did not have close friends. As a result, Sharon was more dependent on Mary than the other way around. This created a dynamic that systems theorists call "pursuerdistancer" with Sharon pursuing and Mary distancing. As is typically the case, Sharon expressed a great deal of jealousy toward the people in Mary's life whom she perceived as posing a threat to their relationship. Her jealousy angered Mary and made her withdraw even further. The pains of her jealousy and the realization that all she succeeds in doing when expressing it is push Mary away brought Sharon into therapy.

The goal of therapy was to change the pursuer-distancer dynamic by helping Sharon stop pursuing. This was accomplished by helping Sharon make some contact with her family of origin (since she was very close to her mother in the past, that proved possible); by encouraging her to visit old friends and to make new ones (the place where she lived had an active gay community that she has never contacted); and most of all, stop calling Mary. When Sharon stopped pursuing Mary, she discovered to her great joy and dismay that now Mary was pursuing her. This change, which is predictable from a systems perspective, helped increase Sharon's security and decreased her jealousy.

Systems Approach Techniques for Treating Jealousy

The role-reversal technique used with Dean and Melanie, in which each mate takes turn describing the other's point of view, is an example of a systems approach technique. It helps couples understand each other better and realize how both contribute to the creation and maintenance of the jealousy problem.

Systems therapists Won Gi Im, Stephanie Wilner, and Miranda Breit suggest a variation of this technique called "Turning the Tables." The nonjealous partner is instructed to act the part of the jealous one. The attentiveness and new-found interest enable the jealous mate to regain lost self-confidence, and allows the nonjealous mate to rediscover the partner's more positive qualities.10 Another technique they suggest is "Scrupulous llonesty." The nonjealous mate is instructed to be unwaveringly honest about every detail of the day's experiences and to flood the jealous mate with information. The flood of information helps dispel anxiety in the jealous mate, who felt excluded and suspicious about clandestine events supposedly taking place.

Yet another technique, used throughout this book, is called reframing." Reframing involves changing the perception of a symptom, a problem, or an action by casting it in a new light. This may be accomplished by refraining the meaning or function of the behavior. Rather than viewing Lillian's affair as a terrible betrayal, the couple learned to see it as a form of communication. Similarly, Darryl's jealousy was describe(] as serving a function in the marriage. This kind of refraining casts the problem, be it unfaithfulness or jealousy, in a less problematic light. Pejorative language used to describe jealousy often prolongs the problem. Instead of using words such as "pathological" or "irrational," one can describe jealousy as a protective response to a perceived threat to a valued relationship. One can further reframe the jealousy problem by describing it as a relationship issue, rather than as the jealous mate's problem. The next step is to figure what function the jealousy serves for both mates and what they are doing to keep the problem alive.

A shared awareness of what both mates are doing to foster the jealousy problem, and what is likely to trigger the jealous response, often helps to break the circular pattern. As family therapist Gayla Margolin notes, "In general, the more spouses know about how their own problems escalate, the more capable they are of handling them. All it takes is for one spouse to refrain from engaging in his or her prescribed role, and the cycle cannot proceed"►z

Margolin cautions, however, that just because the couple has succeeded in disrupting a pattern does not mean the pattern will not reappear. She recommends the establishment of rituals that serve as cues for the new, preferred behavioral sequence, such as weekly "dates" to assess how the marriage is doing. The development of new communication skills can also help circumvent the old patterns. The language of the systems approach, which emphasizes interpersonal processes rather than individual pathology, offers new ways of communicating.

Carlos E. Sluzki, one of the leading systems theorists, notes that jealousy is an interpersonal scenario directed and acted by two players." "Characters involved in the scenarios of jealousy usually experience themselves as totally trapped by the plot, though they are, without knowing it, also its coauthors," Sluzki says. The goal of systems therapy is "to help them discover alternative plots, different scenarios that make them aware that they are the owners of their own lives"►'

An Evaluation of the Systems Approach

The systems approach makes a major contribution to our understanding of jealousy in viewing jealousy as a problem that is best treated at the relationship level. Although the focus is on the relationship, the assumption is that treating the couple involves or leads to individual change as well. As people view their mates and relationships in a more positive and realistic way, they also begin to feel better about themselves. When both partners try to disrupt the destructive pattern in a relationship, positive change happens faster, is more visible for both mates, and is more likely to endure the test of time.

One of the major criticisms of the systems approach is directed at its disregard of the contributions of childhood experiences and unconscious processes to the origin of jealousy. According to critics (most of them psychodynamically oriented), a jealousy problem can never be cured entirely unless these "deeper" issues in the jealous individual are treated.

Question: Is jealousy a result of a particular dynamic in the relationship, or is it a product of unconscious forces in the mind of the jealous individual? My strong belief is that jealousy is both-and much more.

A Note to Therapists

From a systems perspective, the most important task facing a therapist who is asked to help an individual or a couple deal with a jealousy problem is to help the person or the couple understand:

1. the parts each mate played in creating the jealousy problem

2. the (unction the jealousy serves in the relationship

3. the process that maintains and perpetuates the jealousy

 
5

Men Get Angry,
Women Get Depressed

Jealousy is the rage of man: therefore he will not spare in the day of vengeance.

-Proverbs

The jealous are readiest of all to forgive, and all women know it.

-Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karanmzov

Ron and Carol

When Carol met Ron, he had been divorced and a swinger for several years, "trying to make up for all the good limes" he had lost being married for twenty-six years. Soon after they started dating, it became clear to both of them that there was something special about their relationship. Carol told Ron that she was not interested in being just another member of his harem. "If be wanted a relationship with me," she said, "it had to be with me alone." Ron agreed, and has remained sexually faithful to Carol. This, however, did not prevent him from keeping in touch with former girlfriends. Carol describes the growing problems it caused:

His girlfriends call him day and night, paying absolutely no attention to the fact that Ron is living with me now. When I dare say anything about their phone calls or about his going to visit one of them, he attacks me for being jealous, demanding, and un reasonable. He has promised not to have sex with anyone else but me, and he says he has kept his promise. What else do I want? The main reason we decided to come to this workshop was that we both felt a need to work on this problem-which Ron keeps referring to as my jealousy problem. The other reason was to spend a week together at Esalen. [The Esalen Institute at Big Sur, California, became famous (luring the early days of the encounter movement, and is still active as a site for a variety of workshops.) Ron has been here before and told me it was one of the most beautiful places he has ever seen. With that, at least, 1 can agree.

When we arrived here yesterday, the first thing we did was go clown to the office to register. All Of 'd sudden, a woman called Wendy, whom Ron knew from one of his previous visits here, leaped on him and gave him this very big welcome hug. Then she proceeded to massage his chest with a circular motion and I saw the circles growing bigger and bigger, and her hand getting lower and lower down his chest, and I was standing there wondering just how low her hand would get.