dire straits, in

In an awful situation, terrible circumstances. The adjec- tive “dire,” which dates from the mid-1500s, is rarely heard today except in this cliché and one other phrase, dire necessity, which uses it more or less hyperbolically (as, for example, in Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s 1836 letter, “The dire necessity of having every window in the house open . . .”). In con- trast, the cliché describes a genuine difficulty or danger, as in “The stock- market crash left him in dire straits financially.”