Jealous with Shannon
Jealous with Shannon
Mikita: [00:00:00] Time for Tea with Mikita is a podcast about redefining self-care. It's about looking at every aspect of our life, from music, career, family, relationships, and everything in between. It's about spilling tea on those conversations that are sometimes hard to. Well, we're not afraid to have those conversations right here.
Mikita: Join me as we spill tea on every conversation you ever thought about, dreamed about, or whispered about. Hey, y'all, it's definitely time for some tea. This episode of Time for Tea with Mikita is brought to you by LS Music Group professional recording personalized to fit your unique sound. No one is immune to the green-eyed monster of jealousy.
Mikita: And that's why I'm so excited to be sitting down with the one and only Shannon Bryant. [00:01:00] Shannon is a certified life coach and the host of Jealousy Junkie podcast, and Shannon is also real honest, and she doesn't hold back. This is time for T. I'm Mikita, and this is Shannon. With every breakthrough, it
Shannon: starts with a story.
Shannon: Can you tell us
Mikita: a little bit about your journey and what kinda led. To, you really specialize in this, really talking about, , jealousy and how it affects, ,
Shannon: relationships. About eight years ago, I would've said there's no way I would be helping someone get over jealousy or deal with it and make their relationship stronger, more importantly, make themselves more confident.
Shannon: I had it very. Bad. It was really affecting my relationship and my life in general, every single aspect of my life. So, I was dating my now husband, and I've always struggled [00:02:00] with jealousy in my relationships, not just with him, but all of my relationships for as long as I really can remember.
Shannon: And jealousy is really rooted in those insecurities. Many, many times, the majority of the times that comes from something that happened in your childhood or, you know, an event or person, that really led to that. And so for me, my, my environment growing up was very chaotic. My father was an alcoholic and it was very difficult.
Mikita: Not surprisingly, some of the most common emotions children face when dealing with parents that are alcoholic. , her anxiety, fear, depression, guilt, shame, loneliness, confusion, and anger.
Shannon: We, when my parents separated, I was about 12, and I told him at that time, Hey, as long as you're drinking, I don't wanna have anything to do with you.
Shannon: I don't wanna be around you. I don't wanna speak to you. [00:03:00] And he really took that to heart, and I didn't speak to him again until I was about 24 or 25. So there was a big gap of time. That I told myself this story that my dad didn't love me, and if my own father can't love me, why would anybody else, why would anyone else stick around?
Shannon: And so it could be something like that's rooted for someone. They had something in their childhood. It also could stem from. Really, , if someone had in, , infidelity in their relationship or a series of relationships where there was infidelity, that could definitely lead to some of those feelings of jealousy.
Shannon: So I really struggle with that for many, many years. Was in therapy for a long time, in and out of therapy, and I just felt like, oh, this really isn't working. It was more because I went in the mindset like, just tell me what to do, and I'll do it, whatever it is. But I wasn't really [00:04:00] looking at what was going on in me and changing that story that I was telling myself and, and really getting myself to a place of feeling confident, understanding self-worth.
Shannon: and so I, I really just started researching on my own and doing some exercises on my own and along with some therapy along the way, and I was fortunate enough to. , guest for a women's group, , ACA Women's Group that's Adult Children of Alcoholics. And when I was just telling my story of how it was growing up and really trying to connect with them, one of the things that I mentioned was constantly being jealous in relationships.
Shannon: And what was supposed to be an hour talk turned into two and a half hours. The women were like. I have a question. I have that too. You know, I have experienced that. And that's when I knew, uh, man, there's so [00:05:00] many of us that are struggling with this. I need to start talking about it. And so I started Jealousy Junkie, my podcast, and, it, there's been a really great community of women that that struggle with.
Shannon: Have that extreme jealousy, , which is mostly what I work with. But like you said, there are definitely moments or periods in our lives where we do go through some of, man, I just don't feel as confident in myself right now, or man, I didn't realize how. How I wasn't standing on my self-worth, and I wasn't believing in myself.
Shannon: And that's a lot of it. And sometimes, , because
Mikita: like you said earlier, , some people think that maybe they're not having jealousy because it's not that, that big thing that leads to rage, but jealousy encompasses so
Shannon: many different emotions. [00:06:00] Yeah, I mean, I think certainly, as I mentioned, a little bit of jealousy is fine, and it actually can lead us to a point where it's trying to tell us something.
Shannon: So I always tell people when they say, oh, I have a problem with jealousy. I'm so jealous in my relationship. , I'm ruining things because of my jealousy. Jealousy is actually a solution. So jealousy isn't a problem. It can be a problem when it really starts to take hold of your life, but jealousy is a solution.
Shannon: It's there to kind of say, Hey, Mikita, there might be something here that you need to look at, or you might need to investigate this a little more, or just be aware of it. So we don't ever want it to totally go away. As long as you're confident in your relationship and you don't have, as you mentioned, the anxiety, that constant anxiety can really wear on you.
Shannon: So as long as that's not the case, , then a little bit of jealousy is. Totally [00:07:00] okay. But it is when you start to question we're very good at comparison. We wanna compare ourselves to everyone. I think even those that aren't jealous, we start to get into that comparison and really try to put ourselves up against other people and.
Shannon: That is something that is just not healthy for us, and that is an indicator as well that we're not seeing our true unique value and might be something that we need to look at. Has your jealousy
Mikita: ever led you to feel like you were an FBI agent? Shannon talks about those secret action habits that kind of take us overboard when it comes to jealousy.
Mikita: I'm sure you
Shannon: can relate. You feel anxious all of the time. Your head is constantly spinning. You're always. Doing what I call these undercover action habits. So you're checking their phone, you're looking through their email, you're looking them on location [00:08:00] services. Cons. Yes. That's the undercover stuff that I'm doing that they probably don't even know I'm doing.
Shannon: And then there are really those direct action habits that we start doing where we're asking them questions. We're asking our partner questions, who'd you talk to today? What did you do? And we're listening to them. Intently, but not in a loving way. We're listening to see if there's any potential threats, anything that they might have done.
Shannon: Are they telling the same story that they told before? And so when you can recognize that you're doing some of those things, I think that's definitely a, Hey, I probably need to get some help for this because it is something that can really take hold and. It can rapidly grow into something that, feels very out of control.
Shannon: And a lot of people who have this extreme jealousy, it's [00:09:00] years that they suffer from it before they're reaching out to get help. And so by that time, you know, they're really in the throws of it. They've probably ruined some relationships. So I would say those are some really good indicators if you're doing those things.
Shannon: The other thing. Your partner's going to notice those things too. And so there are probably, there's probably been some heated arguments or some, you know, conversations that your partner said, Hey look, you know, as you mentioned, like I just wanna go to the bathroom by myself. I'm good. And it does get to those extremes.
Shannon: I remember there was one evening my husband and I went to dinner, and it was this beautiful place, and it's on the water, and everything should have been great. You know, a jealous person. I immediately, before we even put our name in with the hostess, I've already identified the potential threats that I feel like he's gonna look at her, he's gonna, think she's attractive, those kinds of things.
Shannon: So the entire time is spent with me being [00:10:00] anxious and worried, and I'm not enjoying it. And then, man, the minute he looked potentially in the direction of one of those people that I identified, oh, it was over. It was just, you know, The night was ruined, and he could have just been looking to see where the bathroom was or to look at something on the wall, but in my mind, that's what he was doing.
Shannon: And it, it ruins the, , ruined the dinner. And so certainly your partner's going to notice, um, those things and probably clue you into something you, you may already know.
Mikita: I had to know. What if it wasn't you? The the jealous. How do you deal with the jealous partner?
Shannon: Mm. One thing I will say is if you are a partner of someone who is extremely jealous, one of the things, it's very hard to convince them in the moment that you are [00:11:00] not doing the thing right. Because we all know whether.
Shannon: I'm jealous, or whether it's something that I believe about work. If I'm telling myself that and my brain is, I'm constantly feeding my brain that information, no matter what I think that happened. So going back to the restaurant. I was a hundred percent convinced that my husband looked directly at this person.
Shannon: It's not what happened, but no one was going to convince me cuz I saw it with my own eyes or I heard it with my own ears. And that's something that I think a partner of someone who is jealous has to realize that, especially in the moment when all of that energy, that fear, that anxiety when it is at the.
Shannon: There's really not much you can say that's going to convince them. And so while it is something that the jealous person needs to work on themselves and it really is up to [00:12:00] them to help, certainly if you have a great partner that is really cares for you and wants to work on this with you, if they're calm in the moment and letting you, , tell you what they're thinking, , instead of getting super defensive and defending your stance, like I did not look at her.
Shannon: And reinforcing by saying, oh my gosh, you're crazy. You're so psycho. Those are the things that we hear that, unfortunately, our partners will start saying, and that does just make things worse because, in the jealous person's mind, you're reaffirming that they are someone that you don't wanna be with.
Shannon: And so I think that's, step one is just being calm in the moment, but then also when it's. When that jealous person has potentially settled down, it's just having a really open conversation with them. You know, what can I do to help? What are some of your triggers? Cuz there can be things that you can work on together.
Shannon: If you're noticing [00:13:00], your partner and have that agreement. I can tell that they're getting anxious, and I can tell that they're worked up or this is a situation that's going to cause probably my partner to get a little bit jealous. It could be something that you guys have worked out, like, just put your hand on my leg, or hold my hand at the moment, or come sit by me in the moment.
Shannon: Um, so if your partner's willing to work with you on those things, I think there are those little things that you can do. But again, it really is up to the the jealous person to work through those things and not be dependent on your partner to kind of pull you out of.
Mikita: When you think about your journey and
Mikita: overcoming the jealousy and working through those stages,
Mikita: how did breaking
Mikita: going through that breakthrough helps you to live authentically and true
Mikita: to who are you?
Shannon: My life is completely different than it was before. , it got to the point where we couldn't go to [00:14:00] eat, we couldn't go to the movies. Even watching TV sometimes was hard. , heaven forbid there. Be a bra commercial on or something, you know, it was that extreme, and it gets that extreme for people. summertime is the worst because the pool's open.
Shannon: People wear less clothing. This is a really hard time for people. , so my life is completely different, and I would say that one of the really tipping points was. When I was going through therapy, one of the last things they handed me was called the ACA laundry list, so Adult Children of Alcoholics Laundry List.
Shannon: That is something that really started the whole change for me because often we feel like, and in a lot of things, not just with jealousy, but like I'm all alone in this. I'm all by myself. I'm the only one that thinks this way. I'm the only one that is this bad and. That was when I saw that list of here are the [00:15:00] behavioral characteristics.
Shannon: I was like, oh my gosh, okay, 12 of the 14. Check, check, check, check, check. That's me. But it gave me that sense of knowing, okay, wait a second. If there's a list, that means there's a solution, and I'm not the only one that feels this way or that deals with these things or has those things. So I think knowing.
Shannon: Really started me on this journey of, okay, that means there is a solution, and I'm gonna find it. Um, and so, you know, there's; still, I'm not at where, oh my gosh, I never jealous anymore at all. But the difference is, one, I handle it very differently and. It takes a much bigger trigger now for me to get to that point if that makes sense.
Shannon: So, whereas something before a look in one direction that could have set me off. [00:16:00]
Shannon: Jealousy is an emotion that we've all experienced at one point in our life. However, it's important to recognize when you go from healthy jealousy to obsessive jealousy, and this can be difficult, especially if you're the partner on the receiving.
Shannon: If you want more tips on how to deal with jealousy or a jealous partner, you can reach out to Shannon on Instagram at Jealousy Junkie or her website, jealousy junkie.com. If you love this conversation, then don't forget to leave a review, and you can always email me at thyme4teamikita@gmail.com and keep the conversation going.
Shannon: Go over to my Instagram at thyme4teawithmikita. All right, you guys. This is all the tea that I have to spill today, but don't forget to join me every Tuesday for more delicious hot tea until next time [00:17:00] namaste[00:18:00]