shell-shock

Noun

shell shock (countable and uncountable, plural shell shocks)

1. (historical, uncountable) A psychiatric condition characterized by fatigue caused by battle, corresponding largely with the current diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder.
   • There's a condition in combat—most people know it by now. It occurs when a soldier's nervous system has reached the breaking point. In World War I, it was called shell shock. Simple, honest, direct language. Two syllables. Shell shock. Almost sounds like the guns themselves. Shell shock!!2004, George Carlin, “EUPHEMISMS: Shell Shock to PTSD”, in When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops?, New York: Hyperion Books, →ISBN, →OCLC, →OL, page 40

   Synonyms:

   battle fatigue, combat fatigue

2. (colloquial) A person with the condition.
   • I passed through the shell-shock wards and a yard where the "shell-shocks" sat about, dumb, or making queer, foolish noises, or staring with a look of animal fear in their eyes.1920, Phillip Gibbs, Now It Can Be Told, published 2009, page 350
3. (broadly, figuratively) A stunning shock.
   • "[…]Think of me / With all these psychic shell shocks — first the war, / Its great emotions, then this Elenor."2004, Edgar Lee Masters, Barrett Bays: Domesday Book, page 322
4. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see shell, shock.
   • The other was to go on, to the next drink or the bed or the grass outside, where the party-noises ebbed and flowed like shell-shocks and the Southern Cross burnt crookedly above.1967, Bernard Share, Inish, page 99

See all 5 meanings of shell shock