HE HATES ME HAVING MALE PALS

Dear Coleen

I’ve been with my boyfriend for just over a year now and he’s perfect in almost every way, except he gets jealous really easily.

I’ve got an older and younger brother so I’ve got quite a few male friends, which my boyfriend finds strange. He’s always making comments about this and asking me lots of questions about them.

If I go out with my friends he’ll text me throughout the night and he’ll go through any pictures on Facebook the next day and ask who any men in the pictures are.

I also work in a male dominated workplace and he’ll develop weird jealousies about a particular man and ask me lots of questions about him, like whether I’ve ever fancied him. It’s exhausting reassuring him all the time. A few times in the last six months he’s become very aggressive after a night out and accused me of sleeping around or flirting with some man at the bar. How can I boost his confidence and make him realise it’s him I love?

Coleen says

Do you want my honest answer? I’m not sure you should be boosting his confidence. Alarm bells are ringing that this man is controlling. You can only reassure somebody for so long before it becomes completely draining. Next he’ll start to convince you that you shouldn’t even be going out with your friends, or that you shouldn’t wear that low cut dress or so much make-up.

This is his problem, so don’t you make changes. He’s the one who needs to change. I’d put a stop to this right away and sit him down for a talk.

Tell him, one final time, that you’re not going to cheat. But also tell him you’re not going to be controlled either.

Tell him you feel suffocated, judged, and under pressure and that he needs to stop his jealous behaviour.

Otherwise he really will lose you, and it won’t be to another man, it’ll be because his controlling jealousy is pushing you away.