Fatal Attraction

A person, often but not always a woman, has a romantic liaison with someone, but then changes her mind or loses interest. The jilted lover is so obsessed and/or angry at the end of the affair that he stalks her and kills her. The plot is used often in murder thrillers. Underneath the obvious condemnation of the perpetrator is a faint suggestion of blame that the victim somehow brought it on herself. If she had not slept with the wrong man, if she had kept her eyes open and nose clean, if she had read him correctly ... she would not have provoked his murderous obsession.

Such things obvious do happen, including some high-profile cases, but I wonder how often they really occur. Of all the people I have met and known in my life, no one behaved obsessively and possessively toward their partner, nor were they trapped in a relationship with an obsessive and possessive partner. What's it like to believe, with conviction, that your life will be destroyed if she leaves you? It must be a frightening feeling. It's not realistic of course, but it's a possibility in rare circumstances. Does it happen to only a rare person, or could potentially happen to most people if the "right person came along"?