QC

The old narrative needs heartbreak to be normal and okay in order to accommodate serial monogamy, which I increasingly suspect is actually just terrible. (Have the same suspicion about poly, that doesn't solve it either.)

2) Relationship patterns are self-reinforcing. This goes real deep, tons to explore here, @Conaw gave a cool talk about this recently. E.g. there is a real, tragic, unsettling phenomenon of people who were abused continually finding new partners who abuse them.

Anxious and avoidant attachers continually finding each other is similar. I don't know how to name the general pattern but it has something to do with all your shadow / unprocessed stuff coming out in who you're attracted to.

Then your shadow / unprocessed stuff comes out again, in how you relate to who you're attracted to. From the inside this can come to feel inevitable, e.g. a woman might come to feel that men are inevitably abusive, avoidant, etc. (rather than only the men she's attracted to).

I want to be really clear that I'm not trying to "victim-blame" here. It sucks that some people reliably attract abusers into their lives whatever the causal mechanism. I want to understand what's actually going on so we can actually improve people's lives.

People have "fields" - ways of being that strongly influence how other people behave towards them, that radiate out through words and actions, but also through facial expressions, body language, tone of voice, etc.