Here’s a common retroactive jealousy dilemma:

What if I find out something else about my partner’s sexual past?

Maybe I’ve just about accepted the things I know. But there could be more.

And that feels horribly open-ended – because there could always be more.

Brian’s sexually confident girlfriend

Brian liked his girlfriend’s sexual confidence and energy – he found her attractive and exciting. But there were times when he found it unnerving too.

She’d shared a couple of things, a couple of adventures she’d had, early on. And he’d really struggled with that. Panicked about it, he said.

Over the course of several therapy sessions, we got that panic in check. Result.

Brian was ruminating less on whether her past was too much. He was more tuned into the present, with her, and less tuned into those adventures in his mind.

But as things got better for Brian, we noticed another doubt creeping up on him:

What if I hear or discover something that sets me off again? What if I can’t handle it?

It gave him a constant feeling of threat, he said.

It’s a common shift when we’re working with obsessional doubt or OCD: I’m doing better but what if it all comes back?

And it’s… possible.

As long as Brian is with his confident, sexually-articulate girlfriend, she might be joking or telling a story, maybe after a glass of wine.

And she might mention something else.

You’ve got this, Brian

As a therapist, it’s tempting to say “oh don’t worry Brian. Look how you’ve dealt with those other things, you could do it again, you’ve got this now”.

Kind of true but if you’ve been in Brian’s situation, you know what RJ will say to that: what if I haven’t, what if it’s worse?

Maybe we do some work on making Brian more resilient to his girlfriends past?

Or ways he could close her down a little? “I love you, girlfriend, but please don’t tell me anything else that relates to your past, OK?”

But that’s precarious. We can do better than that.

Because actually, it’s not a new dilemma. It’s more of the same retroactive jealousy doubting and thinking about that doubt.

The same doubt in a new disguise

The specifics of the worry have shifted a bit, but it’s the same process at work in Brian’s mind.

It’s rumination, this time triggered by feeling better. But am I really better? Maybe I need to keep my guard up, I’m not sure I can handle this?

There’s that rising panic again.

It’s the same reasoning about what her past means or might mean, pulling Brian away from the here-and-now reality of his girlfriend, of his relationship with her. Making it feel suspect and precarious.

And the doubt sends him back into the theatre of his mind again, to watch those mental movies of her past.

When I asked what this might mean for the future, Brian said he imagined her blurting out this detail about another adventure she’d had – on their wedding day. And her saying “are you alright, Brian?” as they take to the dancefloor surrounded by smiling family and friends.

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That, Brian, is one hell of a mental movie. And you’re watching it.

Progress doesn’t always feel like progress

This shift to ‘what if it comes back?’ tells us we’re making progress. but we have a little more work to do on the RJ front.

These thoughts about her past are mattering more than they need to. More than the natural discomfort anyone might feel when hearing too much information.

It still feels like a threat. A threat to ruminate about, prevent, resolve. A reason to keep our guard up. A need to stay near the escape-hatch.

Retroactive jealousy is still pushing back, in other words.

Let’s shine a bit more light on the reasoning, the imagining and the self-doubt that keeps us searching for a certainty we don’t actually need.

What the fear was really about

Originally, Brian’s doubts had been around what type of girl she is.

What if she’s a bit too open, too adventurous. What if other people can see this but I can’t? What would other people say or think?

Tuning into the present reality of their relationship, he could see there was no evidence of this.

And those past details, the things she shared, they weren’t too much of anything. She wasn’t too much of anything.

Brian wasn’t a prude or a complete innocent, by the way. He’d had previous sexual experiences. Was that too much too? Of course not, and Brian agreed.

But this time around: what if she mentioned some other sexual detail, at some point?

What’s the worry here? That it reverses everything he knows of her and she IS that type? Too much, too open, too promiscuous?

Brian thought about it. “I guess it feels like that. But in reality, the more I know her, the more I know who she is”, he said.

I pressed on it. “So if this isn’t about what type of woman she is… what would more detail mean that’s so bad, so threatening?”

“Well maybe… what do I bring to her sexual experience? It feels like there would be more to live up to? What if her openness is her kind of telling me I need to live up to that – or she’ll start getting bored?”

ah. We went around the houses to hear that doubt, for Brian to surface it to himself. But that’s how it goes sometimes. We talked about it a bit more.

“Brian, I think that’s quite a natural feeling to have. Her confidence is intimidating, a bit daunting perhaps?”

“For sure” said Brian.

“But is her past really evidence of you… lacking something? Or is your present experience of how you both are together evidence you can rely on?”

He thought about this.

“Real, sensed, bodily evidence that actually, is quite difficult to doubt.”

“Hmm,” said Brian. “Have I been confusing the past for the present?”

Spotting the trick, every time

If you’ve experienced what if something else comes to light… well, I’ll say it again: it’s progress.

Retroactive jealousy is tricky. It will try to reorganise itself around ‘new’ doubts and dilemmas. It will try to have you dismissing present, sensed evidence again.

But if you pay close attention to the doubt – it’s more of the same. What if something is true or happening despite any real, present evidence?

And my top tip: if what if there’s more has got you watching mental movies again: get up, come on out, back into the daylight, back to sensed reality.

You have no business in that theatre, believe me.

I hope this is helpful.