How do I deal with dh's crazy jealousy and save this marriage?

[Flocci]

In a nutshell we have been happily together for almost 15 years but before we got together (aged 18 )whereas I was his first girlfriend in EVERY sense, I had been about a bit, well, a lot actually. He knew that right from the start and was always quite disturbed and jealous but it's not like he could do anything about it, and since we got together we are trusting and happy and totally faithful etc etc so I thought he had just dealt with it.

So now all of a sudden he is literally on the verge of some sort of breakdown becuase he suddenly can't stop thinking about it. He says he constantly imagines me with these other guys and it makes him sick. Although he admits that he knows it is irrational and in every other way we are happy etc he can't get over it. He is in tears, sulky, depressed, shaking, vomitting and having chest pains and panic attacks.

I am trying to be sympathetic but finding it really hard. I have told him that I won't apologise for the past because that was me then so why should I - that's something which I know upsets him. Other than that I am being reassuring and saying I am trying to be supportive and listening to him when he is upset, but TBH I am at the end of my tether. There are only so many times I can say that I am now a different person and totally happy with him and wish he had been my first too but I can't change what has happened so I just don't think about it. I Just want to say - pull yourself together, this is so dumb. I am dreading being alone with him because I know he will start moping on about how upset he is and there is just nothing I can say and do because I can't change the past. I am even thinking of leaving which is crazy because we are happy in every other way, but I can't live with this constant worry and upset and the pressure he is putting me under. Now I am starting to feel sick and shaky wondering what he is going to say next. Maybe I am just being too cold and unsympathetic about this, but what can I do. He has got a doctor appt for next week because he says maybe he needs to get counselling of some sort?

How can we move on when ultimately i can't change what has happened, I won't apologize for it, and I can't change the fact that my previous behaviour is so against his really uptight morals. So how do i go forward?

Any thoughts, please?

He really needs that doctor's appointment. Something is up with him, possibly with a physical cause. You don't just go from being a little bit maybe jealous of your partner's long-ago teenage exes to vomiting, shaking and having chest pains over them.

Something is wrong with him, hopefully something easy to diagnose and treat.

I think the way to proceed is to trat this as an illness and not take it personally or literally.

I'm sorry, you must be very worried.

Agree with skidoodle - sounds like some sort of major nervous issue. Is he stressed in other areas of life and just fixating on this? Has he suffered from depression at all in the past? Sounds like urgent therapy needed as he is looking to you to sort it out but there is nothing you can do. Whatever you do, don't absorb the blame as this won't resolve anything. Really feel for you as this must be frightening and maddening.

Is it really all of a sudden or has he been like thie throughout your relationship and things have just come to a heda now?

I'm sorry you're facing this - it sounds like he's having some kind of anxiety disorder that's very draining on you both.

i would ask two questions

1. Has something happened recently to trigger this in him? A flirtation between you and someone else, or between him and someone else to undermine his sense of normality between you?

2. I know that in the past in a long term relationship, I personally would get very anxious and worried about this kind of thing when in actuality it was ME who was having doubts and worries about being in the relationship generally - a sort of transferance if you will.

Just some things to think about / around it.

I hope he and you find help and a way through.

Thanks for the comments, girls.

I know this has always really bothered him in a big way so it has always been there in the background, but we haven't really talked about it because what is there to say? And I am sure there really is no reason why it should suddenly flare up now - nothing at all on either side.

He has been seriously depressed once before but that was over a very specific thing - his dream career turnbed into a nightmare and he was really down about that until I persuaded him to just walk away and start afresh, which he did and things were ok immediately. I could deal with that because there was a specific problem which was fixable, but this is so different.

I have wondered if he just wants out and this is his way of approaching the subject by somehow trying to make out it is all because of me that he wants to leave, but he assures me that isn't the case, and deep down I don't think so either because in every other way life is good and all is well with us - better thatn it ihas been for a while.

I just wonder what the doc will say - I think dh feels that a chat with a shrink and some pills will "cure" him but that is just not going to happen - he has to DEAL with the issue rather than trying to block it out somehow.