Distresse

Part of speech: noun, verb

Definitions

1. To cause someone acute suffering, anguish, or profound worry
2. To trouble greatly or afflict with severe emotional pain or anxiety
3. To subject to intense hardship, worry, or emotional torment

Etymology: In Middle English, "distresse" was the usual spelling of what we now write "distress," and the final "e" is a trace of its French ancestry. It came into English from Anglo-Norman "destresse," itself from "destreindre," "to press hard, constrain," which descended from Latin "distringere," meaning "to pull apart" or "to stretch in different directions." The Latin verb combined "dis-" (apart) with "stringere" (to draw tight), so the physical image was of something pulled taut in opposing directions. Its earliest English sense was often legal rather than emotional. A "distress" was the seizure of a debtor's goods held as a pledge until the debt was paid, a practice also called distraint. The sense of suffering or anguish came later, as the idea of being pulled tight in conflicting directions shifted toward mental and bodily strain. This legal meaning survives in phrases such as "distress sale" and in the "distrainor" who seizes goods.