Frink adds: "Undue jealousy in a man usually means that he has, or thinks he has, some deficiency of sexual power. It means in a woman, not, as many seem to think, that she is unusually in love with her husband, but rather, that she is not perfectly satisfied with him, and often that she thinks that if he really knew her, he would not be satisfied with her. In most patients suffering from morbid jealousy there is an overaccentuation of the homosexual component of the libido."
Very often some unattractive individual feels jealous because he or she has ceased to attract sexually his or her life mate.
A neurotic, whose face had been made hideous by a discoloration due to illness, was sure his wife must have a lover, because she no longer seemed to feel erotic in his company. His way of reasoning was as follows: "I cannot disgust her, hence some one else must attract her."
=Childish Behavior.= Some neurotics with a strong father or mother fixation become jealous of an otherwise perfectly faithful and devoted mate because they fail to receive from their husband or wife, the sort of attention and uncritical devotion they would expect from a parent. Those people are still children who never admit the possibility of adult equality between them and their mate. The mate must be the strong father or the self-sacrificing mother. They themselves remain babies, constantly to be petted, admired and consoled. If their husband or wife fails to shower on them the thousand little attentions which a nursling requires, they fly into a petty and unjustified rage, suspecting that some one else has robbed them of their privileges.
The Don Juan and the Messalina are quite as jealous as faithful mates. Men leading a double life may watch wife and mistress with equal suspicion. This is probably due to the fact that they feel unable to satisfy both women sexually. Orientals with a harem are said to be infinitely more tigerish in their jealousy than Western men of the most monogamous type. I have known several married women who, altho they had deceived their husbands on several occasions, were terribly upset when their husbands showed too much interest in some other woman.
=The Ego Rampant.= The proprietor of a hotel in a Western town, who lived a few blocks from his inn, was annoyed when his wife refused more and more frequently to come and keep him company at the hotel in the evenings.