The Jealousy Monster and Me

Jealousy is not a big green monster. I mean, it could be for some people, but my jealousy is tiny. It grips the folds of my ear, just inside the external auditory canal, and whispers to me. I've never put it under a magnifying glass, but I'm assuming if I did it would look like a tiny green fuzzball with menacing, jagged teeth, meant to gobble up emotions and spit back hurtful and sometimes irrational things. I know when it's there - it starts as a weird feeling of unease, and the longer I let it hang around the more my brain listens to it.

Everyone might not have a fuzzy green ear-dweller, but everyone experiences jealousy. Those who practice nonmonogamy are not somehow magically excused from it; in fact, we probably experience more of it simply because more people equals more possibilities for it to crop up. Sure, there are some lucky ones out there who say they've never felt jealous, but they are few and far between (and, I'm going out on a limb here, probably lying).

So how do we battle our monsters, no matter which form they might take?

I start where I start with most things: with the idea that knowledge is power. Information about jealousy in nonmonogamous relationships can be found in many sources, from books like Dossie Easton and Janet W. Hardy's The Ethical Slut to a myriad web articles, blogs, and forums. However, the discussion about jealousy that rings truest to me can be found in the book Opening Up by Tristan Taormino.

Sources agree that jealousy is not a cause, but rather an effect: a result of something else. Taormino outlines what some of these causes may be, including envy, insecurity, possessiveness, feeling excluded, and fear of abandonment.  My Jealousy Monster feeds primarily on envy, insecurity, and feelings of or fear of exclusion. Once sated with these emotions, it whispers things like "He's closer to her than than he is with you" (envy), "You'll never please her like he can" (insecurity), and "They're at the top of the Eiffel tower while you're just sitting at your desk surfing Reddit" (feelings of exclusion). Realizing the roots of the jealousy, or what it is that your Jealousy Monster feeds on, is the first step to weakening it.

After that, Taormino urges readers to allow themselves to just feel it. She writes, "Don't criticize yourself or pile shame and judgment on top of [the jealousy] -- that will just make you feel worse." If my Jealousy Monster's first course is envy and insecurity, shame and self-judgement are like its dessert.

So where to go from there? Just as Taormino suggests, I turn to friends and partners for support. Today, in fact, just as I was typing this post, a friend admitted that her Jealousy Monster had been a particular glutton for envy and insecurity, but also enjoyed a particularly big helping of fear. In addition to venting, she just needed to know that her feelings were valid, and that's something that we can all provide for people: the reminder that what we feel is what we feel, and it is only after we have admitted and found the root of that feeling can we move on to try and get past it.

As for my Jealousy Monster, it grows weaker when I replace feelings of envy with focusing on what I have that others don't; when I replace insecurity with doing something I'm good at and really love; and when I replace feeling excluded with getting up from my desk and creating my own adventures. I work on all of these by addressing the roots one by one, and most often talking about them with my partners, both the ones I'm jealous of and the ones whose partners I'm jealous of. It doesn't happen right away, and not usually without help, processing, blogging, journaling, and lots and lots of communication, but with time, the monster has little to nothing left to eat (at least, temporarily).

But I don't kill it nor forget it's there. Everyone's Jealousy Monster will reappear at some point, even if it's much weaker than it was before. It could feed on insecurity again, related to my relationships, but it also could feed on the insecurity that I don't fit into those jeans anymore. The key is to not forget it, but keep it distracted with other things.

I distract mine with marshmallows.

It likes marshmallows.