The reason I feel that jealousy is not integral to love is that I have never, and I’m sure I’m not the only one, felt jealous in my life. I have certainly loved though, and I’ve also had some damn good sex (with the same people I hasten to add). So I would have to disagree that sex and jealousy go hand in hand, as you seem to suggest. On the contrary, in my experience, jealousy in a relationship, and I’m talking about real, obsessive jealousy, kills slowly but surely sexual desire because as Laura mentioned, the “victim” (hate that word) of the jealousy begins, without wishing to, to edit out certain details which might cause pain to their jealous loved one, and suddenly, the relationship is no longer 100% honest. Which of course the jealous person perceives as, “If you can lie to me about that, what else do you lie about?” That kind of mistrust and fear is, I have to say, diametrically opposed to all that makes sex great, for me anyway.

Interesting though, to speculate that the jealousy I have experienced was because I was great in bed! So perhaps I should have taken it as a compliment? I don’t know, I still feel that it was the *perceived* threat that others posed which was the problem. I couldn’t get him to understand that he was the only one I saw.

(Sorry mum.)