The Luv Doc: Doomsday Scenarios

Dear Luv Doc,

I have been dating a girl for about six months that I really like, but she has a really bad habit of trying to make me jealous. Any time we're at a party or a club she always ends up talking to other guys and showing them lots of attention, sometimes for the whole night. I don't think she is cheating on me, but it really makes me mad when she completely ignores me and talks to other guys. I know it might seem like I am the jealous type, but even my friends have started noticing how flirty she is. I try to ignore this behavior because the only time I ever brought it up she accused me of being controlling and said that she could never be with someone who is controlling. Otherwise we get along okay, even better than okay, but I don't like being jealous all the time. What should I do?

– Jealous Boyfriend

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Well, the best way to handle this situation is to not get jealous. There we go. Problem solved. I know, I know. Easier said than done! It's one thing to act all Dirty Harry when you've just met someone and they get a little flirty with someone else, but if you're six months down the line and you've already caught some feels, it's hard not not to turn into a desperate, jealous, groveling emotional trainwreck. You know: the guy exactly no woman wants to date.

The real problem is that you are now intimately aware of what you stand to lose if your girlfriend's flirting goes off the rails, so your mind is running through all sorts of doomsday scenarios, because when people feel threatened that's what their minds tend to do. The minute your girlfriend bats her eyes and brushes her hair back while talking to some dude, your mind fast forwards to an image of them in some sort of tantric pretzel sex position conceiving the Rhodes scholar/olympic athlete/future president you're pretty sure is queued up in your nutsack.

Spoiler alert: No matter how convincing your adrenaline-fueled fantasy feels, there's a pretty good chance it's never going to happen. And even if they do end up hooking up, who's to say they don't do anal instead? Oh, I guess your mind wasn't as doomsday as you thought it was, huh? Anyway, the point is that your chemically jacked-up cerebrum is probably even less trustworthy than your girlfriend. It's also a safe bet that your problem-solving cerebrum is way more sex-positive and open to experimentation than your girlfriend, but that's assuming you trust my cerebrum doesn't have any skin in the game. Sounds crazy, doesn't it, but that's pretty much the way paranoia works. You watch a few too many episodes of Fox & Friends and all of a sudden you're storming the Capitol with a bunch of other right-wing nutjobs thirsting for the blood of Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi. Joke's on you. They're safely locked away in the basement. Probably doing anal.

So, my advice to you is to get in control of your emotions instead of getting in control of your girlfriend. I know that's not an easy ask – certainly not in the heat of the moment, but if you know this is an ongoing behavior, you should have a personal plan in place to keep you from feeling blindsided by it emotionally. An even better approach would be to openly and honestly discuss with your girlfriend how her flirtatiousness makes you feel and enlist her help in devising a plan to diffuse your jealousy in the moment. Who knows? She might surprise you. There are plenty of flirtatious people who crave nothing more than attention – for all kinds of reasons. There are also flirtatious people who crave something more, and if that is what your girlfriend is seeking, it's better to find out sooner than later so you can spend your emotional time and energy on someone who makes you feel special.