I'm (F28) not sure how to deal with jealousy over handsome bf getting female attention, advice appreciated!

I'm 28, my bf is 27. I don't know how to deal with my own jealousy when he gets a lot of female attention. He has to speak in front of large audiences, and of course a lot of them are women. So they giggle and come up to him and hit on him all the time.

That in itself is only a small part of the problem. The main issue is that I don't know how to carry myself with the jealousy I feel. I've analysed it, and it's not related to the fear of losing him, or him choosing one of them. If he does, I would be blindsighted, but move on. It's more of a respect thing for me - if he engages with them or entertains them, because he naturally has a charming and flirty personality, I feel like he is being disrespectful as it's attention that could be directed into our relationship instead. I'd rather focus my sexual energy and attraction on my bf and us, as it would create a stronger bond, than waste it on getting my few minutes of validation from random men fangirling over me.

But I'm not sure how reasonable this seems. Does anyone have any advice? What is everyone else' perspective on this? I would love to know.

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TL;DR - bf gets female attention and I don't know how to handle it. What to think?

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EDIT: Some people have been asking for specific examples of these interactions. Honestly, they vary so much. He used to be naturally REALLY flirty and would flirt with anything that moves - women, men, grandmas, dogs probably. He enjoyed the social interactions and getting attention. This used to get him in trouble and he strung some girls along and they fell in love. He thought this was fine, because he "loves" all humans too, and he would say this - again to everyone. This bugged me a lot, as he would say these things to them with me right there. Did not trust him for 2 minutes alone with anyone.

Anyway, he basically 180'd after that, realising that he wants to be platonic in business to keep things professional. So I trust him fully now, and he deflects flirtations pretty well. Having said that, he still struggles to reinforce boundaries more rigidly with girls that keep pushing. And sometimes do little things that I deem to be inappropriate - like sending emojis that could be misconstrued for flirty (disclaimer: not eggplant).

So I know my jealousy is not unfounded, that's not the question I have. It's more about how to overcome extreme jealousy, to the point that I don't want him talking to any female at all, and any female his eyeballs fall on instantly make me suspicious, even though he is serious about being loyal and doesn't want to intentionally flirt at all anymore.

Submitted March 30, 2020 at 08:45AM by theoreoestofpandas https://ift.tt/2yoT1f1