sick

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   deeply affected by a strong feeling

   sat completely still, sick with envy

2. 2
   noun

   people who are sick

   they devote their lives to caring for the sick

3. 3
   adj

   In poor health; ill.

   We have to care for the sick.

4. 4
   adj

   Having an urge to vomit.

   My daughter was violently sick three times in the night.

5. 5
   adj

   Mentally unstable, disturbed.

   You sick bastard!

6. 6
   adj

   In bad taste.

   That’s a sick joke.

7. 7
   adj

   [with of] Tired of or annoyed by (something that has lasted a long time or often recurs).

   sick and tired of the whining—sick of waiting—'sick of politics

8. 8
   adj

   Very good, excellent, awesome, badass.

   This tune is sick.

Etymology

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 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.