Why Do Women Put Up With Situationships?
The term itself tells you it's a waste of time!
Keep reading until the very end to get a special Thanksgiving offer!
Yesica was very matter-of-fact about it.
“I just ended a three-month situationship after six months. For the past four months, every couple of weeks, I’ve been trying to figure out how to get out of it. We have chemistry and attraction but I’m not getting my needs met. He’s withdrawn, inconsistent, and avoidant. Every time I break up with him, he comes back with everything I want to hear - he’s going to change, he’s going to get better - but his actions never match his words. How do you deal with somebody who consistently tells you he wants to be with you but isn’t stepping up to commit?”
This is a typical question from clients in my Love U Live coaching program, but this time, I didn’t give my typical answer. Instead, I asked Yesica how she was responsible for creating this situation. She paused and replied: “Every time he says he’ll change, I continue to accept his words, despite his behavior.”
This is what she believes. You may, too. I mean, it’s true that she had every opportunity to break things off but hasn’t had the strength to do so. But that wasn’t the REAL issue here. And I told her so - with 30 other women listening on our two-hour weekly coaching call.
“The way you created this dynamic,” I told her, “was by sleeping with a man who wasn’t your boyfriend. Afterward, you waited for him to become relationship-oriented, when he never was. The problem was your decision at the very beginning - not just in the past six months. Once you started hooking up, you couldn’t stop because you were having so much fun, he said all the right things, and you ended up getting attached.”
It’s much harder to break up with a guy after six months of semiregular sex and attention than it is to tell a man who is trying to get laid on the third date:
“Hey, Brad, I’m really attracted to you, I’d love to sleep with you, but I don’t have sex outside a committed relationship. And since we’ve only met a few times, I can’t quite say yet whether we’re meant to be boyfriend/girlfriend. I’m enjoying your company, I’d love to get to know you better, and if we both determine this relationship is worth exploring, we will have amazing sex.”
I call this the “Sexclusivity Speech.” It’s a bulletproof way for any woman who is tired of doing casual to set a firm boundary: “I don’t do situationships.”
If you never hear from the guy after the Sexclusivity Speech, he was, indeed, just looking to get laid, and was never serious about you as a potential partner.
On the other hand, when he sees you’re confident enough to not sleep with him until you’re comfortable he’s worth your time, you’ll probably keep dating - without sex heightening the stakes and clouding your judgment
As always, if you’re fine having sex without commitment - go ahead. I’m sex-positive and an admitted online dating slut - yet most studies show women don’t enjoy casual sex as much as men do. I recently read a feature on hookup culture with tons of charts and statistics from which I pulled this graphic.
If you’ve found yourself in a number of situationships, this is your wake-up call. This study notes there are TWO primary advantages to casual sex.
There’s no commitment!
You get to have sex!
If those aren’t the top 2 things you want from your love life, you’re willingly entering into an arrangement that does NOT serve your long-term interests. Especially given that two of the primary downsides to casual sex include:
Developing feelings
Causing negative emotions
Kind of makes you wonder why anyone would do this at all. Yet open-ended relationships that start with sex and end only when she summons the courage to cut it off are exceedingly common. Here are four reasons you may accept a situationship when what you REALLY want is to be loved.
Emotional Investment: It’s easy to get emotionally attached to a man even if the relationship is undefined - especially if you have a history with emotionally unavailable men. If you’re such a woman - maybe your father wasn’t around, maybe your Mom dated lots of iffy men - inconsistent relationships feel NORMAL. So does sleeping with guys, keeping your fingers crossed, and hoping one of ‘em turns out to be a good one. If this has never worked out for you, it may be time to stop all situationships.
Fear of Being Alone: I get it. Being alone sucks. Life is better shared - whether it’s restaurants, travel, sex, or just someone who checks in occasionally. I liken situationships to being in an ocean, looking for something to keep you afloat. When you find some driftwood, you cling to it for dear life, even though driftwood is at best, a temporary placeholder. Too many women - out of fear of loneliness - stick tight with their driftwood guys, not even realizing there are perfectly good boats that will provide better shelter.
Lack of Clarity: Sometimes, you might be unclear about what you want from a relationship or might not have communicated your desires and boundaries. Next thing you know, you have all the trappings of a relationship - spending time together, emotional intimacy, and physical intimacy - but without clearly defined labels or commitments. This works for him because he DOESN’T want a defined label. The question is why do you accept these terms when they don’t work for you?
Low Self-Esteem: This is at the root of any situationship. You may know you’re brilliant, hot, and accomplished but if you don’t believe you deserve a committed relationship and think this is the best you can do, you will continue to accept situationships - even though they never pan out.
In Love U, I teach that women are the CEOs and men are the interns.
You interview a ton of applicants. Most aren’t right for your company. You dismiss them without further thought. A few have stellar resumes and are charming during the first few interviews. You hire them because you have a job opening, he made a good first impression, and you don’t know there are better interns available.
The problem is not only that you’re taking a chance on a new guy who hasn’t been properly vetted. It’s that:
a. You’re hiring him based on scarcity - the idea that there are no better guys out there. It’s not true. Because if your situationship’s commitment-oriented twin also pursued you, you wouldn’t waste a second on the inconsistent guy.
b. You refuse to fire when you realize - after a few weeks - that he’s never going to live up to his potential.
c. You haven’t refined your job description. You think it’s tall, cute, rich, smart, and charming. You haven’t realized it’s character, kindness, consistency, communication, and commitment.
You haven’t refined your job description. You think it’s tall, cute, rich, smart, and charming. You haven’t realized it’s character, kindness, consistency, communication, and commitment.
Yesica thought her biggest problem was that she didn’t have the courage to fire an unreliable intern who only showed up 1 day a week at work.
In fact, her biggest mistake was giving the intern the job right away, rather than putting him through a few more interviews and job-related tasks. If she had "interviewed” him for a full month without having sex, she would have likely discovered he wasn’t a good long-term fit - just another guy who wanted the benefits of the job without putting in the consistent work.
Every moment, you have a choice: be the intern or be the CEO.
The intern takes whatever crumbs she can get from a cute guy since she doesn’t believe she can do better.
The CEO is willing to hold the job open indefinitely until she finds a worthy intern who continues to demonstrate he’s up for the job.
The choice is yours.
What I Got Wrong
Hello, Evan! I tried following your advice to look for a man who is less ambitious/credentialed. But then this backfired and he felt SUPER insecure and cheated on me (we dated almost 1.5 years). This leaves me heartbroken at 40.
It seems like it was easier for you to marry a less ambitious woman because she was marrying "up" while you were marrying "down." For women it's not that easy. Men's egos are too fragile. He said he felt "small" because we lived "my life" too much. I'm feeling lost and stuck.
Oh yeah and I tried the same thing with another guy for about 9 months. Same thing. Super insecure, felt like he could never measure up even though I catered to his every desire. He would just look at my career, accomplishments, and friends and feel like he didn't belong.
Carrie
I just wrote about this on Monday and want to acknowledge that there are many men who are too insecure to be with a successful woman. But since there are men who are NOT insecure, your best bet is to marry a secure man who earns less rather than hold out for the few men who earn more.
You Can Also See Me On…
It’s not often that I get interviewed by a professional interviewer, but the second I met Dominique Sachs, I knew I was in good hands.
Sure enough, Dominique is a former news anchor who became a mega-successful YouTuber by focusing on issues facing middle-aged women. She has a huge following and after appearing on her show, I couldn’t recommend her podcast - Over 50 and Flourishing - any more strongly.
Enjoy our heartfelt conversation.
You HAVE to Check Out…
TV - Bullshit: The Game Show - As a former Long Island trivia champion, Win Ben Stein’s Money contestant, and bar trivia mainstay (#7 in the country!), I geek out on trivia. This show, hosted by Howie Mandel, is far less trivia and far more bullshit. The questions are dumb, the answers don’t matter - all that matters is whether you can convince others you’re telling the truth.
Movies - A Fish Called Wanda - My wife and I are raising our children on a diet of comedy. This Oscar-award-winning gem from 1988 is one of my favorites. The only problem? It’s too sophisticated for the kids! Now I’ve ruined a classic because of my own eagerness to share my childhood with them. There’s a lesson learned in there.
Substack - 5 Ways to Leverage the Power of Emotions by Michael Easter - Earlier in this post, we talked about scarcity. Well, this author has an entire book called Scarcity Brain. If you believe good men are in short supply, you’ll be far more likely to put up with subpar behavior. Scarcity causes most of your bad decisions in love - which is why I find the CEO framing to be so valuable.
Books - Master of Change - by Brad Stulberg - From recessions, pandemics, and new technologies to marriage, job loss, and becoming a parent, we undergo change—both good and bad—regularly. Change is not the exception, it’s the rule. Yet we endlessly fight it, often viewing it as a threat to our stability and sense of self. This is my favorite book in years! I’m highlighting every page. I’m taking notes in a Word doc. I’m thinking about how all of these principles apply to dating and relationships. It’s 200 pages. Read it, devour it, and thank me later.
The Honey Shot
I originally met Teresa at a client’s wedding in Napa Valley. A few years later, she took Love U and came to a Love U Retreat. Now, she’s married, a coach, and also does enrollment for me. I can’t rave enough about her positive spirit.
Here we are on our wedding day five years ago. Silly hubby doin’ his silly thing…
Teresa L.
Do you have a long dating question? A dissent? A screenshot of a guy’s text? A Honey Shot? Email me at questions@evanmarckatz.com and I’ll respond in a future Lovesplaining. Thanks for being part of my Love Universe!
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Loved the “what I got wrong.” I am finding the same issue. Insecurity among the men that don’t make as much money as I do. It seems that most men sadly get their security from money. Based on my experience, men want you to make a salary somewhat equal to theirs. Most don’t want you to completely depend on them but they also want to feel needed (including financially). So that brings me to ask the question: what are signs that an average income man is secure with himself?
Exactly! 👍