Ralphing

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. The act of ejecting the contents of the stomach through the mouth, often due to illness or disgust
2. Forcefully expelling stomach contents upward and out of the body as a response to nausea or poisoning
3. A physical reaction where stomach fluids are brought back up through the throat and out of the mouth

Etymology: "Ralphing" is the present participle and gerund of "ralph", a verb for vomiting that appears to have emerged in the United States in the 1960s. Its origin is unclear, though it seems to be built on the male name Ralph, possibly with the sound of the verb itself playing a part. The word is informal slang, and its use is largely confined to speech and casual writing rather than formal English. The name Ralph was a common, ordinary given name in mid-twentieth-century America, which may help explain why it was chosen as a playful stand-in for a bodily process people preferred not to name directly.

Synonyms: vomiting, throwing up