Some relationships seem to operate in a permanent state of emergency. There is always another argument, another misunderstanding, another emotional blowup, another breakup, another reconciliation, another promise that things will finally be different. Before long, the relationship itself becomes defined by one thing: the situation.
That’s what many people now call a “situationship.”
While the term is often used to describe undefined dating relationships, I think it captures something much deeper. A situationship is any relationship where chaos becomes the primary experience. Instead of producing peace, security, and growth, it produces constant uncertainty. Every week brings a new crisis that demands attention, and every resolution seems temporary.
One of the greatest dangers of a situationship is that chaos can begin to feel like intimacy.
The emotional highs are incredibly high. The lows are painfully low. After a terrible argument comes an emotional reconciliation that feels almost euphoric. You tell yourself you’ve never felt closer. In reality, your nervous system is simply experiencing relief after prolonged stress. That’s not intimacy. That’s survival.
Healthy intimacy looks very different. It creates safety rather than anxiety. It allows two people to disagree without fearing the relationship will collapse. It encourages honesty instead of manipulation, consistency instead of unpredictability, and trust instead of emotional exhaustion. Healthy love may not always be easy, but it should never require constant emotional firefighting just to keep the relationship alive.
Over the years, I’ve represented many clients whose marriages followed this exact pattern. They weren’t coming to my office because of one isolated event. They were coming because they had spent years living through one situation after another. Financial crises. Emotional affairs. Broken promises. Explosive arguments. Repeated reconciliations. Every chapter looked remarkably similar to the one before it.
Eventually, many of them realized something difficult but freeing: they weren’t simply experiencing conflict. They were living inside a relationship that depended on conflict.
That’s an important distinction.
Every healthy relationship encounters difficult seasons. Jobs change. Children create stress. Illness happens. Finances become tight. Conflict by itself is not evidence of an unhealthy relationship. The question is whether the relationship has the capacity to move through those seasons together, or whether chaos has become the permanent operating system.
A question I often encourage people to ask themselves is this: If all the drama disappeared tomorrow, what would remain?
Would there still be friendship? Respect? Shared values? Genuine affection? Could the relationship simply exist without needing another crisis to give it energy? Or has the conflict become the glue holding everything together?
Those aren’t easy questions, but they’re often the beginning of clarity.
At Robertson + Easterling, we see people at some of the hardest moments of their lives. Our role isn’t simply to help clients navigate the legal process. It’s to help them see patterns they may have normalized for years. Sometimes the healthiest step isn’t winning the next argument or surviving the next crisis. Sometimes it’s recognizing that peace is not boring, stability is not weakness, and healthy love doesn’t require living from one situation to the next.
Because a life-giving relationship shouldn’t constantly leave you wondering what emergency is coming tomorrow.
