What Is Psychotherapy? Proc. 9th Int. Congr. Psychother., Oslo 1973 Psychother. Psychosom. 25: 43-47 (1975)
The Psychotherapy of Jealousy D.H. Morgan
Problems arising from possessive jealousy or delusional ideas of infidelity present in many ways to doctors and to others in counselling situations. Usually the problem has developed over a long period of time, and there have been months or years beforehand, when the verbal and emotional interactions have been built up between a couple, which may have contained the problem, cer tainly will not have resolved it, but may well have quietly aggravated it, until it smoulders up and bursts angrily or miserably upon the outside world, and the therapist, if he is approached at all. Jealousy comprises both the monopolization of the person that is loved, and hostility towards other persons who may covet or be imagined to covet the same person or thing. This exclusivism is in part dependent upon the desire to secure to the uttermost, the person who is loved. The idea is held that we shall obtain less for ourselves if we have to share our ‘ownership’. There is a dread of rivalry, of having, in one’s mind, to compete with others who may be thought to be more worthy of being loved, than we are ourselves. The stages of jealousy comprise: first a fear of loss; second a sense of shame and wounded self-esteem; and third, anger which protects against both by justi fying the hatred, putting the jealous person in the right and so helping partially to restore his self-esteem. In a marriage where both partners are sure of themselves emotionally, fond of the spouse, and have married out of desire, rather than a deep need or a lack of security in the self, then jealousy is not likely to pose much of a problem. But many marriages do not strike this sort of balance and in a marriage where the man or the woman is driven to search for a suitable love object to relieve his doubts about his own value, to reassure himself about his erotic capacity, to give himself the inner security he otherwise lacks, then we have the preliminary emotional material which may lead to the later eruption of problematical jealousy.
Downloaded by: Univ. of California Santa Barbara 128.111.121.42 - 3/26/2018 11:07:25 AM
University of Birmingham, Department of Psychiatry, Queen Elisabeth Hospital, Birmingham
(356) 44
In problematical jealousy we have the wish exclusively to possess the part ner, the partner’s interest, the partner’s feelings, and to be number one in the partner’s eyes, thoughts, and feelings. From this it follows that the jealous individual will allow no rivals, and no competition, so that any flicker of interest shown by his partner in another person, any feeling declared for another person is taken to indicate not just that the interest of the partner is temporarily partially directed to someone else, not just that the affection of that partner has to be shared, but that the partner cannot therefore love the protesting jealous spouse sufficiently, and is on the threshold of infidelity, desertion, or at least some measure of rejection. So you get such statements as: ‘If you smile at him ... ‘If you talk to them ... ‘If you stop on the way home ... ‘If you dress to please others ... ‘If you imitate their ways of doing things, not my way of doing things ... Then you cannot love me properly.’ Namely, you cannot love me sufficiently for my needs. It could be felt, too, that the love is not given or returned to the extent to which it is deserved, but this thought would be shaped and influenced by the jealous person’s capacity for self-deception rather than self-awareness. From the remarks such as: ‘If you smile at him ... ‘If you wear that dress... ‘If you put on that eye shadow ... ‘If you look at those magazines ... ‘If you enjoy such programmes...’ and the inference derived from any of these that the love cannot be wholehearted. From these remarks the jealous progression leads on to the next move to reassure the insecure need for love, and the feelings of anxious attachment, and there appears increasingly tyrannical requests for obedience, for submission to the wishes of the (perhaps) loving, but commanding jealous individual. Namely, ‘If you truly love me, then you will not do the following things.’ These requests, which have a clear-cut command contained in them, may for a long time be met until a pattern is established that the domination:submission development of this nature is the accepted norm within such a household. Con sequently, any failure at a later date to comply is certain to be taken as an indication of disenchantment, of declining affection or even of clear-cut rebel lion. Faced with this stand, the anger, the accusations of infidelity and all the emanations from the jealousy can develop. They develop even when the failure to comply comes from forgetfulness, or a slight wish to assert one’s own ideas, one’s own character and tastes within the marriage, rather than from the growing
Downloaded by: Univ. of California Santa Barbara 128.111.121.42 - 3/26/2018 11:07:25 AM
Morgan
(357) 45
resentment which is eventually bound to develop and lead either to depressive feelings, or to an antagonistic challenge and a determined wish to break free of the yoke that has been placed and accepted for all this previous time. Not many women faced with a possessive jealous husband will take the following advice; ‘Don’t let him dangle you. Look him straight in the face and say, “If you can do better, then look elsewhere’’ - reinforcing it with a true comment of, “I love you, I want to continue in love with and living with you but I do not intend to submit to these impositions.” ’ A young wife, less sure of herself in her marriage, anxious to please, and to some extent flattered by the possessive attention, is more likely to give her assent swiftly to her husband’s command that she should not wear a certain dress when out with friends, or should not turn it up to mid thigh, and then go on to disregard her promise when her friends come to collect her. At the ensuing argument the young woman can see that logically she is in the wrong having broken a promise so given, and therefore feels guilty. So this can lead on to the succession of demands, compliance, failures of obedience, rows and guilt, until the upsurge of resentment becomes very powerful and the formerly contained situation explodes and is exposed to family, friends, doctors and therapists, whether psychiatrist, marriage-guidance counsellor, street-corner friend or preg nancy-advisory service worker. More complicated exchanges and patterns of behaviour can develop between husband and wife which have led to the subjugation of the spouse partly through their own pacifying or unthinking submission. For example: an officer in the Forces was accused by his wife of enjoying looking at a picture of Marilyn Monroe in a magazine. He admitted his enjoy ment, and then consented to a censorship of all magazines which his wife would look at first. He had to shop with her under her direction with his head held erect, so that he might not gaze down at magazine covers or around at other women when in shops. He would repeatedly be confronted with the question ‘What have you been doing in there?’ when he emerged from the toilet, only to flush up with embarrassment and anger, which was taken as a token of guilt. To placate his wife, he did not argue, but the submissive behaviour could be and was interpreted as a further admission of guilt. More accusations followed leading to a reinforcement of the jealousy ideas, rather than the hoped-for reduction. The woman who elects to forego all contact with her friends and sisters at her husband’s command, only to be caught out visiting her newborn niece sur reptitiously; the woman who had to request the GP to allow her husband to attend every surgery consultation in case, in his fears and imagining, she was interfered with; and the man who consented to his wife sprinkling his penis with talcum powder every morning to ensure it was undisturbed by nightfall, are but examples of the developments that may take place before the disruption and declaration of the jealousy occurs.
Downloaded by: Univ. of California Santa Barbara 128.111.121.42 - 3/26/2018 11:07:25 AM
The Psychotherapy of Jealousy
(358) 46
Therapy inevitably has to be with both members of the partnership. Any depression, fear of assault, and many resentments felt by the partner have to be expressed, handled, and relieved. The jealous individual, if not deluded and if not set on vengeance but on a restoration of the marriage, has to be listened to accurately and non-judgmentally all the time, with the therapist aware that the jealous person’s own self-esteem, personal and sexual confidence is, and may always have been, low. By the time the problem has been declared to outsiders and to a therapist, both members of the partnership will be low in self-esteem, the jealous individual from his/her underlying psychopathology, the partner from his/her participation in this subjugation situation for so long until it reached crisis point. Provided both partners originally were fond of each other, and have retained some of that liking in spite of the difficulties, then the thera pist is in a position to establish a positive link with both husband and wife, and to aim optimistically at an improvement in the situation. In transactional analysis terms, he has to deal with the grown-up problem solving aspect of each partner, letting each one realize the detailed dominance submission exchanges, that have developed between them, and letting them select which of these they will forfeit as a demand, or resist as a compliance, while ensuring to each other, and wherever possible, via the therapist, that this in no way means a reduction of interest and affection in the partner, but is a necessary move to restore the self-esteem of one, if not both partners, by ex tracting at least one item of misinterpretation of verbal exchange, or action of subjugation from the present state of the marriage. Through the therapist as intermediary, but only if he is accepted by both partners to the jealousy prob lem, it is possible to reduce the mistrust of the partner, and the mistrust of one’s self and the impulsive emotional behaviour that have been an accompaniment of so many marital transactions, in the build-up before the crisis point has arisen. As an illustration: the demand of one husband for intercourse every night, with his wife’s refusal indicating that her interest must be with another, proved to be a case in point where discussion with both partners, before and after an agreed resistance by the wife, was able to lead to this issue becoming much less urgent for both of them. The sexual relationship became more enjoyable to the wife, more satisfactory to the husband, since he could easily perceive his wife’s pleasure, and he then began to believe not only that he was the essential man in his wife’s eyes, but was more valued in his own estimation. As I have already mentioned, if the feelings are of overwhelming intensity, so that the jealousy has led to total delusions of infidelity - ‘Trifles light as air are to the jealous, confirmations, strong as Holy writ’ - or if the feelings lead to impulsive and devastating anger, then the situation is one that must be treated with a full understanding of the point that has been reached, both in the jealous individual’s mind and in the response of the partner. Underlying depression, schizophrenia, or contributing alcoholism can all be factors and must be treated,
Downloaded by: Univ. of California Santa Barbara 128.111.121.42 - 3/26/2018 11:07:25 AM
Morgan
The Psychotherapy of Jealousy
(359) 47
where this is possible. But they do not eliminate the need to think of a jealousy problem as the result of a series of developing personal interactions that have occurred over many months and years, involving trifling events and situations, far more often than not, being the consequence of one family argument or a near affair. It is clearly possible, at the same time, to apply the insights gained from a detailed family history, of childhood links to parents and sibling rivalry, to helping individually the members of this partnership.
Request reprints from: D.H. Morgan, Senior Lecturer and First Assistant, University of Birmingham, Department of Psychiatry, Queen Elisabeth Hospital, Birmingham BIS 2TH (England)
Downloaded by: Univ. of California Santa Barbara 128.111.121.42 - 3/26/2018 11:07:25 AM
But I do believe that a full attempt to learn about and understand the peculiar patterns of verbal and behavioural transactions that exist within each partnership, is an essential element in dealing with the problem of jealousy, where it is amenable, by psychotherapy. In this way the saying: ‘My Reason, the Physician of my love, angry that his prescriptions are not kept, hath left me’ can be put into reverse.
The Psychotherapy of Jealousy D.H. Morgan
Problems arising from possessive jealousy or delusional ideas of infidelity present in many ways to doctors and to others in counselling situations. Usually the problem has developed over a long period of time, and there have been months or years beforehand, when the verbal and emotional interactions have been built up between a couple, which may have contained the problem, cer tainly will not have resolved it, but may well have quietly aggravated it, until it smoulders up and bursts angrily or miserably upon the outside world, and the therapist, if he is approached at all. Jealousy comprises both the monopolization of the person that is loved, and hostility towards other persons who may covet or be imagined to covet the same person or thing. This exclusivism is in part dependent upon the desire to secure to the uttermost, the person who is loved. The idea is held that we shall obtain less for ourselves if we have to share our ‘ownership’. There is a dread of rivalry, of having, in one’s mind, to compete with others who may be thought to be more worthy of being loved, than we are ourselves. The stages of jealousy comprise: first a fear of loss; second a sense of shame and wounded self-esteem; and third, anger which protects against both by justi fying the hatred, putting the jealous person in the right and so helping partially to restore his self-esteem. In a marriage where both partners are sure of themselves emotionally, fond of the spouse, and have married out of desire, rather than a deep need or a lack of security in the self, then jealousy is not likely to pose much of a problem. But many marriages do not strike this sort of balance and in a marriage where the man or the woman is driven to search for a suitable love object to relieve his doubts about his own value, to reassure himself about his erotic capacity, to give himself the inner security he otherwise lacks, then we have the preliminary emotional material which may lead to the later eruption of problematical jealousy.
Downloaded by: Univ. of California Santa Barbara 128.111.121.42 - 3/26/2018 11:07:25 AM
University of Birmingham, Department of Psychiatry, Queen Elisabeth Hospital, Birmingham
(356) 44
In problematical jealousy we have the wish exclusively to possess the part ner, the partner’s interest, the partner’s feelings, and to be number one in the partner’s eyes, thoughts, and feelings. From this it follows that the jealous individual will allow no rivals, and no competition, so that any flicker of interest shown by his partner in another person, any feeling declared for another person is taken to indicate not just that the interest of the partner is temporarily partially directed to someone else, not just that the affection of that partner has to be shared, but that the partner cannot therefore love the protesting jealous spouse sufficiently, and is on the threshold of infidelity, desertion, or at least some measure of rejection. So you get such statements as: ‘If you smile at him ... ‘If you talk to them ... ‘If you stop on the way home ... ‘If you dress to please others ... ‘If you imitate their ways of doing things, not my way of doing things ... Then you cannot love me properly.’ Namely, you cannot love me sufficiently for my needs. It could be felt, too, that the love is not given or returned to the extent to which it is deserved, but this thought would be shaped and influenced by the jealous person’s capacity for self-deception rather than self-awareness. From the remarks such as: ‘If you smile at him ... ‘If you wear that dress... ‘If you put on that eye shadow ... ‘If you look at those magazines ... ‘If you enjoy such programmes...’ and the inference derived from any of these that the love cannot be wholehearted. From these remarks the jealous progression leads on to the next move to reassure the insecure need for love, and the feelings of anxious attachment, and there appears increasingly tyrannical requests for obedience, for submission to the wishes of the (perhaps) loving, but commanding jealous individual. Namely, ‘If you truly love me, then you will not do the following things.’ These requests, which have a clear-cut command contained in them, may for a long time be met until a pattern is established that the domination:submission development of this nature is the accepted norm within such a household. Con sequently, any failure at a later date to comply is certain to be taken as an indication of disenchantment, of declining affection or even of clear-cut rebel lion. Faced with this stand, the anger, the accusations of infidelity and all the emanations from the jealousy can develop. They develop even when the failure to comply comes from forgetfulness, or a slight wish to assert one’s own ideas, one’s own character and tastes within the marriage, rather than from the growing
Downloaded by: Univ. of California Santa Barbara 128.111.121.42 - 3/26/2018 11:07:25 AM
Morgan
(357) 45
resentment which is eventually bound to develop and lead either to depressive feelings, or to an antagonistic challenge and a determined wish to break free of the yoke that has been placed and accepted for all this previous time. Not many women faced with a possessive jealous husband will take the following advice; ‘Don’t let him dangle you. Look him straight in the face and say, “If you can do better, then look elsewhere’’ - reinforcing it with a true comment of, “I love you, I want to continue in love with and living with you but I do not intend to submit to these impositions.” ’ A young wife, less sure of herself in her marriage, anxious to please, and to some extent flattered by the possessive attention, is more likely to give her assent swiftly to her husband’s command that she should not wear a certain dress when out with friends, or should not turn it up to mid thigh, and then go on to disregard her promise when her friends come to collect her. At the ensuing argument the young woman can see that logically she is in the wrong having broken a promise so given, and therefore feels guilty. So this can lead on to the succession of demands, compliance, failures of obedience, rows and guilt, until the upsurge of resentment becomes very powerful and the formerly contained situation explodes and is exposed to family, friends, doctors and therapists, whether psychiatrist, marriage-guidance counsellor, street-corner friend or preg nancy-advisory service worker. More complicated exchanges and patterns of behaviour can develop between husband and wife which have led to the subjugation of the spouse partly through their own pacifying or unthinking submission. For example: an officer in the Forces was accused by his wife of enjoying looking at a picture of Marilyn Monroe in a magazine. He admitted his enjoy ment, and then consented to a censorship of all magazines which his wife would look at first. He had to shop with her under her direction with his head held erect, so that he might not gaze down at magazine covers or around at other women when in shops. He would repeatedly be confronted with the question ‘What have you been doing in there?’ when he emerged from the toilet, only to flush up with embarrassment and anger, which was taken as a token of guilt. To placate his wife, he did not argue, but the submissive behaviour could be and was interpreted as a further admission of guilt. More accusations followed leading to a reinforcement of the jealousy ideas, rather than the hoped-for reduction. The woman who elects to forego all contact with her friends and sisters at her husband’s command, only to be caught out visiting her newborn niece sur reptitiously; the woman who had to request the GP to allow her husband to attend every surgery consultation in case, in his fears and imagining, she was interfered with; and the man who consented to his wife sprinkling his penis with talcum powder every morning to ensure it was undisturbed by nightfall, are but examples of the developments that may take place before the disruption and declaration of the jealousy occurs.
Downloaded by: Univ. of California Santa Barbara 128.111.121.42 - 3/26/2018 11:07:25 AM
The Psychotherapy of Jealousy
(358) 46
Therapy inevitably has to be with both members of the partnership. Any depression, fear of assault, and many resentments felt by the partner have to be expressed, handled, and relieved. The jealous individual, if not deluded and if not set on vengeance but on a restoration of the marriage, has to be listened to accurately and non-judgmentally all the time, with the therapist aware that the jealous person’s own self-esteem, personal and sexual confidence is, and may always have been, low. By the time the problem has been declared to outsiders and to a therapist, both members of the partnership will be low in self-esteem, the jealous individual from his/her underlying psychopathology, the partner from his/her participation in this subjugation situation for so long until it reached crisis point. Provided both partners originally were fond of each other, and have retained some of that liking in spite of the difficulties, then the thera pist is in a position to establish a positive link with both husband and wife, and to aim optimistically at an improvement in the situation. In transactional analysis terms, he has to deal with the grown-up problem solving aspect of each partner, letting each one realize the detailed dominance submission exchanges, that have developed between them, and letting them select which of these they will forfeit as a demand, or resist as a compliance, while ensuring to each other, and wherever possible, via the therapist, that this in no way means a reduction of interest and affection in the partner, but is a necessary move to restore the self-esteem of one, if not both partners, by ex tracting at least one item of misinterpretation of verbal exchange, or action of subjugation from the present state of the marriage. Through the therapist as intermediary, but only if he is accepted by both partners to the jealousy prob lem, it is possible to reduce the mistrust of the partner, and the mistrust of one’s self and the impulsive emotional behaviour that have been an accompaniment of so many marital transactions, in the build-up before the crisis point has arisen. As an illustration: the demand of one husband for intercourse every night, with his wife’s refusal indicating that her interest must be with another, proved to be a case in point where discussion with both partners, before and after an agreed resistance by the wife, was able to lead to this issue becoming much less urgent for both of them. The sexual relationship became more enjoyable to the wife, more satisfactory to the husband, since he could easily perceive his wife’s pleasure, and he then began to believe not only that he was the essential man in his wife’s eyes, but was more valued in his own estimation. As I have already mentioned, if the feelings are of overwhelming intensity, so that the jealousy has led to total delusions of infidelity - ‘Trifles light as air are to the jealous, confirmations, strong as Holy writ’ - or if the feelings lead to impulsive and devastating anger, then the situation is one that must be treated with a full understanding of the point that has been reached, both in the jealous individual’s mind and in the response of the partner. Underlying depression, schizophrenia, or contributing alcoholism can all be factors and must be treated,
Downloaded by: Univ. of California Santa Barbara 128.111.121.42 - 3/26/2018 11:07:25 AM
Morgan
The Psychotherapy of Jealousy
(359) 47
where this is possible. But they do not eliminate the need to think of a jealousy problem as the result of a series of developing personal interactions that have occurred over many months and years, involving trifling events and situations, far more often than not, being the consequence of one family argument or a near affair. It is clearly possible, at the same time, to apply the insights gained from a detailed family history, of childhood links to parents and sibling rivalry, to helping individually the members of this partnership.
Request reprints from: D.H. Morgan, Senior Lecturer and First Assistant, University of Birmingham, Department of Psychiatry, Queen Elisabeth Hospital, Birmingham BIS 2TH (England)
Downloaded by: Univ. of California Santa Barbara 128.111.121.42 - 3/26/2018 11:07:25 AM
But I do believe that a full attempt to learn about and understand the peculiar patterns of verbal and behavioural transactions that exist within each partnership, is an essential element in dealing with the problem of jealousy, where it is amenable, by psychotherapy. In this way the saying: ‘My Reason, the Physician of my love, angry that his prescriptions are not kept, hath left me’ can be put into reverse.
