I was at a friend’s birthday picnic a few weeks back with a bunch of his friends, and I was talking to one woman there who I hadn’t seen before. I found out she’s from Sweden and is in an open relationship with a Mexican guy.
She was saying that she struggles a lot with jealousy.
But that it’s not fair because she hooks up with others often and he doesn’t actually go out and hook up with that many people.
“I’m the one who’s jealous, yet I’m also the slutty one.”
She felt like a hypocrite, a fraud.
“I get that,” I say. “But just for some perspective, wouldn’t it be worse the other way around?”
She looked a bit confused.
“Well, if you were the jealous one and your partner was the one constantly hooking up with other people. Wouldn’t that be worse?”
“Yeah, well maybe…” she responded, although she didn’t look relieved.
Then her friend, a man with long curly hair and eye liner replied, “It also makes sense because you see what it’s like from your side. It’s almost like your experiencing what he could be experiencing, so you can more easily project what it could be like for him. Which makes you more jealous at the idea of him with someone else.”
I shook my head, totally confused by this comment.
The idea could have made sense (the logic tracked) but it was coming from someone who is monogamous, and it was totally opposite of my experience.
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