What does sicking mean?
“Sicking” is the present participle of the verb “sick,” meaning to make someone ill or to cause vomiting. In its standard extended form, “sickening,” it is much more common to describe something that provokes intense disgust, horror, or revulsion: a person may call an act of cruelty “sickening” or describe a foul odor as “absolutely sickening.” The expression can also retain a literal connection to illness, though this use is less frequent in modern English. “Sicking” itself is now uncommon outside dialectal material, literary writing, or forms of the word in which it is immediately completed by another element. For most contemporary uses, “sickening” is the appropriate form.
verbThe present participle of sick, used chiefly in dialectal contexts to mean making someone ill or causing vomiting.
- Causing illness or nausea.
- Causing intense disgust or revulsion.
"The smell of the disinfectant was sickening everyone in the room."
"The heat in the kitchen was sickening."
"She described the cruelty in the report as sickening."
The word “sickening” can describe either physical illness or intense disgust, as in “That excuse was sickening.”
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Where does sicking come from?
The word “sicking” is formed from the verb “sick” by adding the present-participle ending -ing. The verb “sick” developed the meaning of causing illness or nausea, as well as vomiting, and has been used in English since the Middle English period. Its extended sense of causing disgust developed through the idea of something that makes one feel sick or revolted. The cognate adjective “sicker,” meaning sick, survives mainly in Scottish and northern English usage.
How sicking is actually used
As an independent headword, “sicking” is uncommon and normally appears in the spelling “sickening.” The latter is standard in both British and American English. The figurative sense involving disgust is now much more common than the literal sense of causing illness.