Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • transitive & intransitive verb To make or become sick. synonym: disgust.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To fall sick; fall into ill health; become ill: used of persons, animals, or plants: as, the fowl sickened; the vine sickened.
  • To experience a sickening sensation; feel nauseated or disgusted: as, to sicken at the sight of squalor.
  • To lose force or vitality; become weakened, impaired, or deteriorated: said of things (in technical use, especially of mercury: compare mortification, 1 ).
  • To make sick; bring into a disordered state or condition; affect with disease, or (more commonly) with some temporary disorder or indisposition, as nausea, vertigo, or languor: as, the bad odors sickened him.
  • To make mentally sick; cause to feel nauseating contempt or disgust. See sickening.
  • To make nauseatingly weary (of) or dissatisfied (with); cause a disgusted dislike in: with of: as, this sickened him of his bargain.
  • To bring into an unsettled or disordered state; impair; impoverish: said of things.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To make sick; to disease.
  • transitive verb To make qualmish; to nauseate; to disgust.
  • transitive verb obsolete To impair; to weaken.
  • intransitive verb To become sick; to fall into disease.
  • intransitive verb To be filled to disgust; to be disgusted or nauseated; to be filled with abhorrence or aversion; to be surfeited or satiated.
  • intransitive verb To become disgusting or tedious.
  • intransitive verb To become weak; to decay; to languish.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb transitive To make ill.
  • verb intransitive To become ill.
  • verb transitive To fill with disgust or abhorrence.
  • verb intransitive To be filled with disgust or abhorrence.
  • verb intransitive To become disgusting or tedious.
  • verb intransitive To become weak; to decay; to languish.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb upset and make nauseated
  • verb cause aversion in; offend the moral sense of
  • verb make sick or ill
  • verb get sick

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

sick +‎ -en

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Examples

  • The chronicler stated simply that "the following month [August] Louis, the son of King Philip, began to sicken from a most serious illness, which is called dysentery by the physicians."

    A Tender Age: Cultural Anxieties over the Child in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries 2005

  • Now Rabbi Yoffie says wars "sicken" him, even the wars he supports.

    Shalom, Shabbat, & Shibboleth 2009

  • After enduring sufferings such as sicken one in the bare recital the remnant staggered into the settlements, more dead than alive.

    Reminiscences of a Pioneer William Thompson

  • After enduring sufferings such as sicken one in the bare recital the remnant staggered into the settlements, more dead than alive.

    Reminiscences of a Pioneer Thompson, William, Colonel 1912

  • WASHINGTON —The Food and Drug Administration has decided to ban some uses of a class of antibiotics on livestock out of concern that bacteria that sicken humans are becoming resistant to the drugs.

    FDA to Ban Some Antibiotics for Livestock Bill Tomson 2012

  • The Food and Drug Administration will ban some uses of antibiotics in cattle, pigs, chickens and turkeys out of concern that food-borne bacteria that can sicken humans are becoming resistant to the drugs.

    FDA Moves to Restrict Use of Antibiotics in Livestock Bill Tomson 2012

  • Senators Coburn, Sessions, Kyl, Graham, et. al, sicken me with their condescension and rudeness to Judge Sotomayor.

    Sotomayor: Judges have different task than what citizens expect 2009

  • Not drive them out, not sicken them, but kill them.

    Fire The Sky W. Michael Gear 2011

  • Here, Sheldon Harris reported, they would have to eat food laced with one of 31 germs — anthrax-filled chocolate, plague-treated cookies, typhus-infected beer — or be injected directly with deadly pathogens to determine the minimal dose required to sicken or kill them.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » Biological Weapons Amnesia 2010

  • Here, Sheldon Harris reported, they would have to eat food laced with one of 31 germs — anthrax-filled chocolate, plague-treated cookies, typhus-infected beer — or be injected directly with deadly pathogens to determine the minimal dose required to sicken or kill them.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » 2010 » May 2010

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