🔧 Repairing 🪛 A fastener 🐾 Animal sterilization 🧫 Sample preserving

fixing

6 6.5

Making an animal unable to have babies by surgery

noun
/ˈfɪksɪŋ/

Informal

: esterilización

The veterinarian recommended fixing my cat to prevent future health problems.

Examples

After the fixing, they explained how to care for the pet during recovery.
She took her dog to the vet for a fixing to ensure it could not have puppies.
-Home fixing to shave Mister.

The Color Purple (1985)

Synonyms

sterilization

vsfixing

Specialized

22 4.9

To stop an animal or person from having babies

is the animal focused routine procedure rather than a broad medical process

neutering

vsfixing

Specialized

4 4.2

An operation that makes an animal unable to have babies

is the routine veterinary operation aimed specifically at preventing animal reproduction

spaying

vsfixing

Specialized

3 6.1

To remove a female animal's ovaries and usually her womb to stop her having babies

is the general veterinary sterilization used for both sexes rather than only females

altering

vsfixing

8.2

Surgery that makes an animal unable to have babies

is the common everyday term used by veterinarians for that procedure

surgical contraception

vsfixing

Specialized

5.8

A medical operation that permanently prevents pregnancy

is the regular veterinary sterilization for general population control not only pregnancy prevention

Antonyms

breeding

Specialized

90 3.1

The process of producing new animals or plants by choosing which ones mate

Compounds

price-fixing

Specialized

6 6.6

Competing sellers agree to keep prices at a set level to limit competition

nitrogen-fixing

Specialized

1 4.9

Able to change nitrogen in the air into a form plants can use

fixing agent

Specialized

6.7

A chemical that makes dyes or photos stay on cloth

Surface Forms

fixing singular

fixings plural

Morphology

fixing = fix (semi-transparent) = fix + ing

Derived from the colloquial/veterinary verb 'to fix' meaning 'to sterilize' — relation to the general sense 'make something nonfunctional for reproduction' is not obvious to all learners.

Etymology

Fixing is used in everyday speech for spaying or neutering animals, and a helpful way to remember this is to think of fix as 'to make settled'. So to have an animal fixed is to 'settle' its ability to have babies and prevent future litters.