This is sort of an interesting and timely thread for me. My husband and I have been together since 1994, so whatever jealousy issues we had back then (and I for one had plenty) have long since been worked out. His best not-me friend is a woman, and in some ways they probably spend more time together than we do, because they work together and go to lunch together every day. But she's my friend too and I have no issues with that relationship -- in fact, I fully support it and the extent of my jealousy is that they go to a lot of restaurants that I am too busy to visit, and they never bring me take-out.

Right now, though, I am unable to ride, and we are not spending any fun time together, mostly because I am not having any fun ... I'm just working, getting the house ready for a baby, and sitting around with my damn feet up wondering whose dumb idea it was to have a baby in August. I can barely walk two blocks, much less get on a bike or go hiking or do any of the stuff that we usually do for fun.

Meanwhile, he's joined a cycling club and going for long rides every weekend. The fact that there are women in the group doesn't bother me (I have joked about the fact that he is spending his weekends with hot young chicks in spandex while I am here turning into Shamu, but it is really not an issue, and in fact one of those young chicks is probably going to be our part-time nanny); I am mostly jealous of the guys. Because he rides with them all the time, and I am not riding at all, and I am petty and bitter and I want to go have fun and let him sit around with his feet up for a change.

For me, irrational sexual jealousy -- i.e., the idea that he might run off and screw some young thing if I let him out of my sight or "allow" him to interact with other women -- is my own problem, one I am glad to rarely experience these days, and one that I would not tolerate in my partner if the tables were turned. But sadness and a feeling that you are being neglected because your partner is having all of his or her fun with other people, that's a different issue, and one that does need to be addressed. So I would say that it is really important to figure out which of these things is going on.

(My husband has been very adamant that we take the grandparents up on their offers of babysitting once the baby arrives, so that we can go back to riding together even before she is old enough to tag along, and we should be able to resume other stuff like hiking as soon as I am recovered and the baby can hold her head up in the carrier. So our situation is, I hope, temporary, but I am pretty cranky about it right now.)