I’ve never been a jealous girl.
However, more years ago then I’d care to admit, awash with a healthy dose of high school angst, I was definitely envious. That is, if your definition of envy is something like this:
a feeling of discontent or covetousness with regard to another's advantages, success, possessions, etc.
For me, ‘a feeling of discontent’ pretty much covers ages 13 -18. I was quite simply, a mess. Looking back now, I can’t pinpoint even one of the things that I would have changed, but whatever I had, it wasn’t what I wanted.
My first real heart-breaker relationship was very dramatic, we were just out of high school, both taking classes a local community college, both working at least one job, and both our families were expecting an engagement announcement any minute. We had been together for a couple of years when one day while dropping his dog off at his house I saw a stack of pictures of him and another girl on the national mall on the 4th of July. A date he’d broken with me because “he had to work”.
I was crushed. I cried for hours.
He had just started a new job that very day, so I had hours to wait before I could say my piece. I cleared my head, dried my tears, and left him a message that I was taking him out to dinner at his favorite place. Over dinner I told him I knew about the 4th of July. He stuttered, sputtered, rationalized, and finally apologized. I listened to every word. Then left his sorry ass with no ride home and the bill.
I was hurt, make no mistake, but not jealous.
As an adult, I’ve been asked countless times by the men I’ve dated if I’m “the jealous type” The answer has always been no. If that first heartbreak taught me anything, it taught me that there truly is nothing I can do to overcome what someone else wants to do.
In the serious relations ships that followed, I quickly learned that if I felt insecure, there was a good reason. And if there was a good reason, I didn’t really need to know who or what it was, I just wanted out. The good reason wasn’t necessarily another woman, it was just as often their own insecurities or inability to commit to a relationship - same feeling, different cause.
Regardless of the cause, I knew that wasn’t where I needed to be. I’ve never bought into the ‘my other half’, ‘you complete me’, ‘soul mates’ line of thinking. My mother gave birth to a whole baby 37 years ago, I wasn’t missing a thing.
That’s not to say that I think there isn’t a great deal to be gained and enjoyed from a good and lasting relationship. I'm sure there are many things, things I can't know and very possibly things I'd like very much if I could know about them. I guess it’s just to say that I’ve yet to see one that made me jealous.
However, more years ago then I’d care to admit, awash with a healthy dose of high school angst, I was definitely envious. That is, if your definition of envy is something like this:
a feeling of discontent or covetousness with regard to another's advantages, success, possessions, etc.
For me, ‘a feeling of discontent’ pretty much covers ages 13 -18. I was quite simply, a mess. Looking back now, I can’t pinpoint even one of the things that I would have changed, but whatever I had, it wasn’t what I wanted.
My first real heart-breaker relationship was very dramatic, we were just out of high school, both taking classes a local community college, both working at least one job, and both our families were expecting an engagement announcement any minute. We had been together for a couple of years when one day while dropping his dog off at his house I saw a stack of pictures of him and another girl on the national mall on the 4th of July. A date he’d broken with me because “he had to work”.
I was crushed. I cried for hours.
He had just started a new job that very day, so I had hours to wait before I could say my piece. I cleared my head, dried my tears, and left him a message that I was taking him out to dinner at his favorite place. Over dinner I told him I knew about the 4th of July. He stuttered, sputtered, rationalized, and finally apologized. I listened to every word. Then left his sorry ass with no ride home and the bill.
I was hurt, make no mistake, but not jealous.
As an adult, I’ve been asked countless times by the men I’ve dated if I’m “the jealous type” The answer has always been no. If that first heartbreak taught me anything, it taught me that there truly is nothing I can do to overcome what someone else wants to do.
In the serious relations ships that followed, I quickly learned that if I felt insecure, there was a good reason. And if there was a good reason, I didn’t really need to know who or what it was, I just wanted out. The good reason wasn’t necessarily another woman, it was just as often their own insecurities or inability to commit to a relationship - same feeling, different cause.
Regardless of the cause, I knew that wasn’t where I needed to be. I’ve never bought into the ‘my other half’, ‘you complete me’, ‘soul mates’ line of thinking. My mother gave birth to a whole baby 37 years ago, I wasn’t missing a thing.
That’s not to say that I think there isn’t a great deal to be gained and enjoyed from a good and lasting relationship. I'm sure there are many things, things I can't know and very possibly things I'd like very much if I could know about them. I guess it’s just to say that I’ve yet to see one that made me jealous.
