Dating has gotten so complicated that we had to invent a whole new vocabulary for it. Situationship. Breadcrumbing. Ghosting. Orbiting. Zombieing. Cushioning. Benching. Each of these words describes a specific way modern relationships break or refuse to become real. The fact that we needed this many new words in a single generation should tell you something about how weird things have gotten. I wrote this glossary partly to be useful and partly to make a point. The point is that every one of these terms describes a failure mode that previous generations did not have names for, which suggests that dating used to work differently, and that we are now doing something new that is, for many people, much worse.

The Glossary

Situationship: A relationship that has the emotional weight of a real one but none of the commitment or clarity. You are sleeping together, texting daily, acting like a couple, but you are not a couple. Neither of you has defined anything. Nobody is willing to be the first one to ask. Ghosting: The original and still most common form of modern exit. Someone disappears from your life with no explanation. Yesterday you were talking. Today they are not responding. You will never get closure unless they decide, months or years from now, to explain, which they probably will not. Breadcrumbing: Sending occasional small messages to keep someone interested without any actual intention of starting or continuing a relationship. Usually done by people who are not sure what they want and are keeping options open at the cost of other people's clarity. Orbiting: Not messaging, but continuing to like and watch someone's posts on social media after the connection has otherwise ended. The digital version of hovering at the edge of someone's life without actually being in it. Zombieing: Ghosting you, then coming back from the dead months later as if nothing happened. Often with a simple "hey, how have you been?" Cushioning: Keeping a few backup people on the line while you are in a relationship, in case the relationship ends. Emotional infidelity that most people engaged in it would not quite call that. Benching: Keeping someone in the romantic equivalent of the practice squad - interested enough that you might call them up someday, not interested enough to actually start something.

What All of These Have in Common

The Thing Nobody Wants to Name

Every word in this glossary describes a failure of clarity or commitment. Not a failure of chemistry. Not a failure of compatibility. A failure of clarity. Someone in the scenario does not know what they want, or does know and is not willing to say it, or is willing to say it only in ways that preserve their own options at the cost of the other person's peace. The reason modern dating has become so hard is not that the people in it are worse than previous generations. The reason is that the structural supports for clarity have weakened. Dating used to happen in contexts where commitment was either expected or off the table. You knew which category you were in. Now every interaction is ambiguous, every status is unclear, every future is hypothetical. The ambiguity produces all of these failure modes, because unclear situations attract unclear behavior.

Why AI Companions Entered the Chat

Here is where this connects to something I care about. A lot of the interest in AI companions, especially among women in their twenties and thirties, is a direct response to the dating dictionary above. AI companions do not ghost you. They do not breadcrumb. They do not benchmark your value against other options. They do not orbit your Instagram instead of texting you. They do exactly what most people actually want, which is to engage consistently and clearly. This is not a substitute for a real partner. It is a response to a market failure. The market failure is that the actual dating market has gotten bad enough that a consistent, clear, attention-giving alternative has become appealing even when everyone knows it is not the same thing as a human relationship. If the dating market worked better, AI companions would be a novelty. Right now they are a feature nobody planned to be necessary, and they are popular for reasons that reflect more on the dating market than on the AI.

What to Do With All This

If you are in the middle of dating right now and you feel like you need a glossary just to describe what is happening to you, I want you to know that is not your fault. The situation is genuinely weirder than it used to be. Take care of yourself. Do not accept ongoing confusion as a relationship. Use whatever tools help you feel attended to and clear. And remember that the mess is structural, not personal, which is cold comfort but at least not the kind of comfort that requires you to feel bad about yourself.