Tips on Jealousy
Like stress, jealousy can be dealt with in healthy or unhealthy ways.
Healthy: examining your feelings and where they come from and sharing your feelings with your partner.
Unhealthy: telling your partner they must stop doing things that ‘make you jealous’.
- Jealousy is often related to feelings about yourself- sometimes doing things to increase your confidence like joining clubs and teams, seeing a counsellor, journaling about your strengths and spending time with people who make you feel good about yourself can help to build self esteem. This can help if your jealousy is related to feelings about not being good enough for your partner.
- Talk about it with your partner- but in a way where you take responsibility for your feelings and actions, not asking your partner to stop spending time with certain people.
- Try to build trust in your relationship: Often jealousy is an indicator that you don’t trust your partner. Recognize you do not need to trust everyone not to flirt with your partner – you only need to trust that your partner will reject any advances.
Signs that you or your partner’s jealousy may be a problem include: feeling out of control, destructive behaviour, controlling behaviour (like telling your partner they cannot hang out with friends of the opposite sex or exes), and lack of responsibility of choices and actions.
A relationship full of control is a relationship out of control
If you are being controlled, speak to your STAR counsellor through student services or contact the Haldimand & Norfolk Women’s Services Crisis Line at: