distresses

Noun

distress (countable and uncountable, plural distresses)

1. Physical or emotional discomfort, suffering, or alarm, particularly of a more acute nature.
   • To heighten his distress, he is approached by his wife, and bitterly upbraided for his perfidy in concealing from her his former connexions (with that unhappy girl who is here present with her child, the innocent offspring of her amours, fainting at the sight of his misfortunes, being unable to...1833, John Trusler, chapter 8, in The Works of William Hogarth: In a Series of Engravings, archived from the original on 04 Nov 2011

   Synonyms:

   anguish, torment

2. A cause of such discomfort.

   Synonyms:

   hardship, sorrow, affliction, aggrievance, grief, grievance, misery, ruth, sadness, undelight

3. Serious danger.
   • a ship in distress

   Synonyms:

   jeopardy, peril, adventure, danger, harm's way, extremity, threat, menace, hazard

4. An aversive state of stress to which a person cannot fully adapt.

   Antonyms:

   eustress

5. A seizing of property without legal process to force payment of a debt.
6. The thing taken by distraining; that which is seized to procure satisfaction.
   • If he were not paid, he would straight go and take a distress of goods and cattle.1596 (date written; published 1633), Edmund Spenser, A Vewe of the Present State of Irelande […], Dublin: […] Societie of Stationers, […], →OCLC; republished as A View of the State of Ireland […]...

See all 9 meanings of distress