Link Centre Dictionary

sick

UK/ˈsɪk/ US/ˈsɪk/ very common slang uk
adjective (4) noun (1) verb (1)

adjective

1.

not in good physical or mental health

  • “ill from the monotony of his suffering”
Synonyms
Antonyms
Similar
2.

feeling nausea; feeling about to vomit

Synonyms
Similar
3.
4.

having a strong distaste from surfeit

  • “grew more and more disgusted”
  • “fed up with their complaints”
  • “sick of it all”
  • “sick to death of flattery”
  • “gossip that makes one sick”
  • “tired of the noise and smoke”
Synonyms
Similar

noun

1.

people who are sick

  • “they devote their lives to caring for the sick”

verb

1.

eject the contents of the stomach through the mouth

  • “After drinking too much, the students vomited”
  • “He purged continuously”
  • “The patient regurgitated the food we gave him last night”
Synonyms
Antonyms

Origin

From Middle English sik, sike, seek, seke, seok, from Old English sēoc (“sick, ill”), from Proto-West Germanic *seuk, from Proto-Germanic *seukaz, from Proto-Indo-European *sewg- (“to be troubled or grieved”). See also West Frisian siik, Dutch ziek, German siech, Norwegian Bokmål syk, Norwegian Nynorsk and Swedish sjuk, Danish syg; also Middle Irish socht (“silence, depression”), Old Armenian հիւծանիմ (hiwcanim, “to be weakening”). The "very good, excellent" sense is an ameliorative semantic shift from the original sense of "in poor health". Compare similar semantic development in terrific and wicked.

Phrases

  • be sick
  • be taken sick
  • call in sick
  • call out sick
  • dope sick
  • euthyroid sick syndrome
  • fall sick
  • get sick
  • sick sack
  • sick up

Related words

Word family

Broader terms

See also

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.