2005-05-11
By Deogratias Mushi

Any human being possesses a certain percentage of jealousy, and, in fact, this is undoubted truth. Allow me begin by making the observation that there is no twisted object like love. Love is never uniform.

It is subject to many forms, interpretations, and feelings, and there are no standard measures that one can employ to get the perfect picture of love, because each individual feels differently. Other people experience love in inflaming, low intensity pull, betraying but little outward signs that they are burning up, being consumed by the fires of passion.

Yet others show it by a violent disposition, physically pining away at the absence of their loved ones, and brightening up, pulsating with life, when their dear ones are present. These different degrees of responsiveness to love, a person’s temperament so to speak, also manifest differently when this love is threatened. But what we should assert first is that the feeling of jealousy is never born where there is no love. For sure jealousy is a wrecker of relationships, where one party suspects the other of double dealing. Often there are quarrels, fights, breaking down of relationships. The heart thumps, the head swells, there is a constriction in breath – generally day turns into night, when a man for example, suspects that his girl is cheating on him.

There is no bigger tragedy in a man’s life than suspecting that some other man is running your girl; that the girl you love so much, is sharing her heart, and probably more, with you and another.

What is worse – such cases are very difficult to resolve. The ache will remain permanently.

But what is the prime cause of this? Too much love! Too much love will kill you, goes. Song, but you will not die due to the intensity of feelings for him or her, however much your heart thumps for them. What is probable is that you will die from the mere wisp of suspicion that she is seeing another person, then coming back into your arms, pretending to be as holy as a Muslim who does not miss all five daily prayers. When people are in love, there is an abundance of trust. There is a general feeling of putting your whole lifes existence in the other partys hands. So it becomes a betrayal of the highest degree when cracks appear in this armoured trust, and no amount of confrontation will take away these gnawing pangs of jealousy. They become a cancer, and the most frustrating thing is that the fact that there is a cloud between you, you can stop loving him or her. No. You can not tear yourself from your partner, because despite the feeling of insecurity that has engulfed the relationship, you are still held captive by cupids arrow.

The other day I was conversing with a hard-talking woman I met at a wedding, and in the course of talking, she asked the ladies in the group what they would do if their husband brought a woman back home, and coolly introduced her as a co-wife. The reaction, much as it was highly indignant, however, did not match the fury that greeted the lady when she cheekily posed the same question to the men. How could she even think about it, they fumed. But there it was. The tampering of exclusive rights to someones heart, purse, body – everything. And it was clear men felt more strongly than women about this hypothetical threat.

But perhaps this has leanings on feelings of male dominance than that they feel more! A discussion about jealousy can never be quite complete without some allusion to Shakespeare’s Othello. The man is always roundly condemned for having such intense pangs of jealousy, that eventually led him to strangle his beautiful Desdemona. No one ever feels with him, that he loved so intensely, but was seeing, right before his very eyes, his wife ostensibly being wooed by another. There was that issue of incontrovertible proof. Everyone would have died with jealousy, because everything pointed to the fact that his wife was being unfaithful to him. We should blame too much love, not jealousy. Even when he was deciding on her manner of death, he did not want to disfigure her loveliness.

I put it before you ladies and gentlemen, that you never flare completely out of temper when your spouse accuses you of cheating, because then you can be sure that he or she still hold you dear.

deomushi@guardian.co.tz

* SOURCE: Guardian

We found an excellent article by Jon Marshall of New City Chicago that all of our people in the military can relate with. The following is an excerpt of Jon’s article

John Moore helps soldiers in combat tend to their wounded hearts

The major couldn’t stop crying.

He was haunted by the memory of writing a letter to the parents of an 18-year-old under his command in Iraq who had died in combat. When the major returned to his suburban Chicago home in November, depression colored his days and his relationship with his wife soured.

John Moore of Wrigleyville keeps hearing stories like this one. Through the online class about relationships he teaches for American Military University, U.S. troops tell him about family troubles and emotional wounds that have festered while serving in Iraq, Afghanistan and other danger zones.

The soldiers share stories about snipers, land mines and car bombs. They also tell Moore how they’re afraid their spouses are cheating on them, or how they’re riddled with guilt because of their own infidelity. They tell him about wanting to come out of the closet, or about their pregnant girlfriend, or about not knowing their own children after being gone for up to fifteen months. They tell him about the anger, jealousy and uncertainty they feel.

Once the approximately 170,00 soldiers deployed in and around Iraq and Afghanistan finally head home, Moore worries, they won’t be ready for the emotional reality of their homecoming and America won’t be equipped to support them.

“If they don’t have a safe conduit to talk about it, it’s like a time bomb,” Moore, 34, says.

Moore tries to defuse that emotional time bomb through his class, “Interpersonal Communications,” better known at American Military University as “Love 101.” Each month a new group of fifteen-to-twenty soldiers and military spouses signs up for the eight-week class, which he launched in 2002. The class lets soldiers trying to prove how tough they are in combat reveal vulnerabilities they would never share with their own units.

“The whole culture of the military is that you don’t talk about feelings or emotions,” says Moore, the author of “Confusing Love with Obsession” (iUniverse, 2003) and a counselor at Chicago House, a North Side agency for people living with HIV/AIDS. “For people who feel alone, this is a conduit for them to communicate intimate things. By the second or third week, students start to share their feelings. By the end it’s a crescendo of emotion.”

With a crew cut jutting across his forehead, piercing dark eyes and the wiry yet muscular build of a man who works out regularly, Moore looks ready to go into combat himself. From his office, he sifts through emails, assignments and discussion board postings from students based in Iraq, Afghanistan, the United Arab Emirates, Korea, Saudi Arabia, Japan, Germany and the United States.

“Trying to remain faithful to my wife has been very difficult,” writes Rob (names of soldiers in this story have been changed to protect their privacy), a 24-year-old Army private from Kentucky who was shipped to Iraq for a year one month after getting married. “About four months after being deployed, I found myself having an affair with a woman who was recently divorced. I feel so much guilt about cheating on my wife, but a man has needs and it is not easy being alone for all this time.”

Marital strains such as Rob’s only add to the danger of military life. A 2002 Defense Department survey found that military personnel with high levels of stress are twice as likely to get sick or injured. “You can’t fight an enemy effectively if you’re worried your wife is sleeping with someone or if your kid is sick,” Moore says.

For instance, Greg, an Army private from Chicago, was driving a truck in July of 2003 near Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit when a roadside bomb exploded, destroying his right arm. Greg wasn’t thinking about safety before the bomb exploded, he told Moore. Instead, his mind was in turmoil: his wife had just told him she was unhappy with their relationship, and he had just learned his time in Iraq was being extended sixty days.

This kind of emotional burden becomes even heavier when soldiers can’t talk about their relationships, Moore says.

Jerusalem – A wronged Israeli wife – whose husband made love to his secretary in a bachelor hideaway – quenched her lust for revenge by indulging in her own extra-marital dalliances in the same rented apartment.

The woman, from the northern coastal city of Haifa, hired a private detective to track her cheating husband down to a flat he rented on the sly to pursue his affair, reports said. Striking back, the woman found the keys to the flat, made a copy and arranged her own sex trysts in the same property for two years before being found out by her suspicious husband. The man then filed for divorce despite his repentant wife begging him not to leave. A judge ordered the couple to reflect on a future together and undergo marriage counselling before again petitioning for divorce.

08 May 2005

Men beware: your partner may be watching you. Armed with sophisticated bugging devices, women are becoming the latest recruits to the hi-tech world of espionage.

Not that they are travelling the world as undercover agents: their targets are closer to home. A survey published this week will reveal that nearly three out of four women are prepared to spy on their husband or boyfriend if they suspect them of infidelity.

Nearly three-quarters, 72 per cent, of the 10,000 cohabiting or married women surveyed said they would snoop on their partner’s mobile phone text messages, and just over a third, 34 per cent, would secretly follow their partner.

They have seen David Beckham and broadcaster Rod Liddle get into trouble over text messages. But checking phones is not enough for many. Women are also flocking to courses to learn how to spy on their errant partners using a range of devices.

Gary Williams, director of a company which runs spy courses, and who commissioned the survey, said he was amazed at the number of women signing up. “Our course was aimed as a special day out for men, or for corporate sessions,” he said. “But then we noticed that a lot of women were coming along. When we asked them why, they said they wanted to spy on their partners.”

On the course, which is run by ex-special forces and police, women can learn to use covert cameras and UHF radios, bugs and lock-picking gadgets. They can also learn how to throw an axe and use a rifle, perhaps in case their suspicions are confirmed. About 100 people a week are taking the course in three centres across the country.

It is all part of the booming domestic spy industry – a result of technology such as text and email which makes it easier, yet more dangerous, to have affairs. Dave Allan, who owns the Spy Store in Leeds, the country’s leading supplier of eavesdropping gadgetry, said he has at least one woman a day coming in wanting to spy on her husband.

“The increase in domestic spying has soared, especially with women,” he said. “Our business used to be 60 per cent to business and 40 per cent domestic; now that figure is the other way round.

Full Story

We found this very interesting article in the Pilot-Independent and think it will be interesting to many of you.

Are you having an affair? Have you just ended an affair? Do you have a secret from long ago that is eating away at you? Do you reveal it or not?
Once your secret is out, you can’t get it back. There will be lifelong repercussions. If you decide not to tell, your silence will take an insidious toll of its own, both on you and on the marriage. Here are some things to consider as you make your choice.

Reasons for not telling — self-protection for yourself and others
• Your motive is to hold onto both your lover and your spouse, while you are caught in a dilemma, wanting both in your life.
• You are bargaining for the luxury of working through your own emotional ambivalence before putting yourself in a position of having to choose between them.
• You are trying to absolve yourself of guilt.
• You are trying to protect the third party from any repercussions that may spill over from your own revelations.
• You are trying to protect yourself from the conflict and emotional fallout that will ensue if the affair is revealed. You worry if you have the ability to deal with the anger, hurt, accusations and deep grief your revelations will cause.
• You are trying to cushion any ensuing divorce conflict or custody battle by keeping the affair secret.

Reasons for not telling — protecting your
marriage or your spouse from harm
• You conclude your partner is too fragile and vulnerable to react constructively to the news and that your affair will shatter his or her sense of self.
• You may be afraid the revelation will cause more harm than the affair itself and will lead to an unwanted separation or divorce.
• You may be fearful of your partner’s ability and willingness to love and forgive you in spite of the betrayal.
• You want to address marital problems without putting your spouse through the difficult task of learning to trust and forgive you.
• You worry that your partner will get caught up in an obsessional focus on the details of the affair and will be swallowed up with bitterness and resentment.
• You worry that your thoughts and feelings about the marriage will be discounted or not listened to.

Reasons for telling — self serving
• You share the affair as an exit strategy to end an unhappy marriage.
• You disclose the affair to lash out and hurt your partner for a past emotional wound.

Reasons for telling — restore and strengthen your marriage
Rebuild trust. If you want to rebuild your relationship, tell the truth before your partner discovers it some other way. You can help regain trust by not engaging in a cover-up. Secrecy, lies and deception can be almost as devastating as the affair and complicate the recovery process.
Leaving the discovery up to the hurt spouse creates a huge barrier of trust that is difficult to surmount. When a discovery ends an affair, it leaves much more doubt and hurt. Choosing to leave an affair and disclosing it freely is much more affirming of how you value of the marriage.
Because you fooled your partner, he or she may go into a “seek and find” mode, looking for signs of infidelity. Promises aren’t believed. The obsessions about lies and dishonesty will be prolonged.

Truth strengthens commitment to remain faithful
By keeping an affair secret, it is easy to avoid looking at motives or needs and to pretend the marriage itself doesn’t need much attention. By keeping the secret, you can lull yourself into believing that the absence of conflict is better than learning any lessons from the affair.
By telling the details of the affair, the motives, maneuvers, lies and excuses become known to the spouse. He or she will know how you pulled it off and will know what to look for in the future. By sharing this information freely, humbly and honestly, you show your partner you are committed to the marriage and are willing to be honest.

An honest look at the marriage
By revealing an affair, you give your spouse a fair chance at learning your marital grievances and addressing them. A confession may be seen as a cry for help with the marriage. With all the pain that your confession may cause, it also creates an opportunity to improve your marriage.
Even if you remain faithful, living with unexpressed dissatisfactions and resentments will rob your marriage of true intimacy and enjoyment. Discussing the affair is an opportunity for self-examination and honest dialogue.

True equality and intimacy
By telling the truth to your partner, you show that your marriage is the relationship that matters. You give your partner power. Your partner is free to decide what to do when armed with the truth. You can reconnect as equals.
You allow your partner to know you. You share the hidden pain, resentments and loneliness of the paths each of you has been on. Dishonesty is the enemy of intimacy.
With the disclosure, you also give your partner a chance to accept you, warts and all. This acceptance is evidence of his or her love for you.
Which is better — to tell the truth or not tell the truth? You decide.
Ideas for this column were drawn from the book, “After the Affair,” by psychologist Janis A. Spring.
Val Farmer is a clinical psychologist with MeritCare in Fargo, N.D. He specializes in rural mental health and family business consultation. Dr. Farmer’s column is sponsored by Cass County Social Services. For more information on affairs and forgiveness, visit Val Farmer’s Web site at www.valfarmer.com.

An affair, wild and impulsive buying and depression, could all be signs of a midlife crisis. Here’s are some ways of telling if you’re going through one.

You are having an affair. Many men feel a decreased sense of virility as they grow older, hence the need to ‘prove’ their masculinity. And what better way to prove it than with the new secretary of 20? Many men who have been faithful all their lives, suddenly develop a roving eye in their forties or fifties, to the unavoidable detriment of their family life. The kind of woman they go for, is also often not really their type, but she is virtually, without exception, young and pretty. These are the qualities many men feel validate their masculinity.

Sudden interest in and change of appearance. If your idea of keeping up with fashion has always been an annual, single shopping spree in a chain store, and you have suddenly become fashion-conscious and also started wearing clothes meant for men half your age, you could be having a midlife crisis. A sudden desire to dye your hair or change your hairstyle, or to spend lots of time in front of the mirror, could point in the same direction.

Resurrection of youthful behaviour. You suddenly show an interest in contemporary music, or go to places where people younger than you generally hang out. Or interests that you used to have, suddenly become interests again after many years. Or old friends that haven’t been seen for years suddenly make a reappearance. You also feel the need to come up to speed with the latest in communication technology, such as SMS’s and e-mails.

Sudden depression. Midlife is a time of reflection for many men. Goals you may have had in your teens and twenties, that may not have been reached, can be a cause for depression, because many men believe that what they have not achieved by age 50, is unlikely to be achieved afterwards. Some men can also become aware of their mortality and find this daunting. Many men have also reached a plateau in their careers and find themselves harking back to their glory days. They also have lots of family responsibilities during this time in their lives, and these can also feel overwhelming.

Lack of interest in spouse/family. You could suddenly lose sexual interest in your spouse or general interest in your family life. The lack of sexual interest could also signal the presence of another woman or insecurity with regards to sexual performance. Lack of interest in sex could also be a sign of depression.

Change in social patterns. If you have always been a homebody and suddenly start going out to all sorts of pubs and clubs or starts having boys’ nights out for the first time, it’s midlife-crisis time. A change in social patterns usually signifies something significant’s happening.

Sudden increase in alcohol consumption. If you suddenly start drinking heavily, you could be harking back to your youth, or the increased drinking could be a reflection of where you are hanging out and with whom. You could also be stressed out or depressed, which could lead to the increased alcohol consumption.

Sudden impulsive decisions. These are a hallmark of the midlife crisis. Sudden and life-changing decisions are made, such as resigning your job, emigrating, selling the house, asking for a divorce, etc.