I help you with hypnotherapy for jealousy in relationships as a clinical hypnotherapist (AHA) psychotherapist and family therapist (PACFA).
This may be in a specific relationship or may have happened in many of your other relationships. You’re not alone as it happens to many people.
It’s important to address what you are experiencing as jealousy as it can be emotionally damaging to yourself and others. It can very quickly end a relationship.
You may be seen as clingy, overbearing and demanding too much attention. Partners and future partners may see you as a major attention seeker and avoid you.
What is jealousy in relationships?
Jealousy is when you are suspicious of other people’s actions or intentions. It’s a deep feeling you get which makes you panic. A small amount may be normal to protect the relationship, but too much is destructive. (1)
You may become aggressive, accusatory, or obsessively follow partners, look at their phones or listen in on their conversations.
What makes it jealousy is that your suspicions are not actually based on any real facts. So, you have constructed a delusion inside your mind which has become an unhealthy obsession.
It becomes overly consuming, takes up a lot of your time and draws you away from your ordinary life.
Are your suspicions real?
People often say, ‘follow your gut’, in other words the feeling you get in your stomach. Since you gut produces 95% of your serotonin (feel good hormone), there are times when this is right.
But and this is a very big ‘but’, if you are delusional, those feelings can mislead you.
Yes, people do cheat in relationships, have affairs and lie. (2) They may even have children with other people. Other people may flirt with your partner or try to have an affair with them. That’s just a fact of life.
This of course also depends on the guidelines by which you agree to engage in the relationship. What have you both agreed on?
The only real time to be suspicious of a partner’s actions is when you have facts and not just suspicions. Not just one fact but several.
Why do you get jealous?
Jealousy arises through your personal sense of insecurity. You have always been or have become unsure about your partner’s actions.
You have developed poor attachment styles to partners. You don’t trust. Maybe you had a previous relationship where a partner cheated on you, lied about it and refused to own up to their actions.
Perhaps, you were never taught to have any good, secure long-term relationships by your parents. If they weren’t’ able to do that themselves then they couldn’t teach you those skills. (3)
You or your partner mightn’t understand, or you have not created clear rules and guidelines on how to run the relationship. It important to have those conversations so each of you knows the rules of road, so to speak. If you don’t then resentment arises when your partner does something that you don’t believe is right.
Communication is the key
When working with people is relationships I always come be to the pivotal key principle for any relationship:
Where you’re in a couple, ménage à trois or polyamorous relationship there has to be those conversations about what is expected from each person involved. (4)
Only then do you truly know if the relationship is right for you and how each you can help the other person feel safe.
Relationships come with obligations so it’s important not to have resentment and suspicions negatively poisoning everyone’s well-being.
A home and family are supposed to be a wholesome safe place with those within it supporting each other in good and difficult times.
Using third parties
If you are in the throes of jealousy, you need help outside the relationship. Trying to solve it between you is toxic because you should never be each other’s therapist.
Seeking the help of a professional so you can deal with your own issues separated from the relationship and come back to it in a positive, constructive mindset.
As a couple, when jealousy has become an issue its time for you both to seek help from a trusted family therapist, community or family elder. (5)
Third parties can see things happening within the relationship that you can’t because you are too close.
Learning your sense independence
Jealousy in relationships is a form of co-dependent behaviour. Its when you’re too dependent on the other person’s behavior to make you feel secure.
I understand you may have children or are in a long-term finically interdependent relationship and don’t want a third party to threaten the stability of that family unit.
People, however, get lost at times. They do behaviours they aren’t supposed to but it’s important to remember that about them and not necessarily you.
Independence is when you stay strong at those times and not letting your life fall to pieces because of what someone else is doing, partner or not. (6)
Hypnotherapy can help
In jealousy you’re too close to see the big picture. Your emotions are blocking the big picture so you can’t really see what is happening.
In hypnosis I will help you get a better view of the whole situation, so you have more resources, skills, and options. This enables you to engage with a partner in a more positive and productive way.
Also, during hypnotherapy, I will teach you skills and help you activate them about how to be more independent as an individual.
This way you have better control of your emotions and learn to have relationship based on real facts not delusions.
With hypnosis the whole therapy goes faster so you can get on with your life and have good rewarding relationships.
Dr Tracie O’Keefe DCH, BHSc, ND is a clinical hypnotherapist, psychotherapist, family therapist and naturopath who works in Sydney. You can connect with from anywhere in the world by zoom.
References
(1) Fernández, A. M., Barbato, M. T., Cordero, B., & Acevedo, Y. (2023). What’s love got to do with jealousy? Frontiers in Psychology, 14, 10568137. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2023.10568137
(2) Rokach, A., & Chan, S. H. (2023). Love and infidelity: Causes and consequences. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 20(2), 2055. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20020555
(3) Ma, T., Tellegen, C. L., & Sanders, M. R. (2024). The role of parenting self-efficacy on teacher-child relationships and parent-teacher communication: Evidence from an Australian national longitudinal study. Journal of School Psychology, 92, 16-30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsp.2024.01.016
(4) De Netto, P. M., Quek, K. F., & Golden, K. J. (2021). Communication, the heart of a relationship: Examining capitalization, accommodation, and self-construal on relationship satisfaction. Frontiers in Psychology, 12, 767908. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.767908
(5) Lebow, J., & Snyder, D. K. (2023). Couple therapy in the 2020s: Current status and emerging developments. Frontiers in Psychology, 14, 10087549. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2023.10087549
(6) Kluwer, E. S., Karremans, J. C., Riedijk, L., & Knee, C. R. (2020). Autonomy in relatedness: How need fulfillment interacts in close relationships. Frontiers in Psychology, 11, 7057354. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.7057354
