to soil oneself
- phrasal verb
- /sɔɪl wʌnˈsɛlf/
- NSFW
- The haunted house was so terrifying, I almost soiled myself.
Examples
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As the thunder crashed loudly, she feared she would soil herself from shock.
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When he saw the snake suddenly slither by, he was so frightened that he nearly soiled himself.
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He laughed so hard at the joke that he thought he might soil himself.
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The horror movie was so intense that I actually soiled myself during the scariest scene.
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During the fireworks display, the loud booms made her so anxious that she thought she might soil herself.
Synonyms
To be so frightened that you almost wet yourself
How Messy
- NSFW
- Offensive
- Offensive
- NSFW
Surface Forms
Morphology
The combination 'soil' (to make dirty) + 'oneself' (reflexive) transparently yields 'make oneself dirty', so a learner who knows the words will grasp the general idea of dirtying one's clothes. However, the conventionalized narrow meaning—specifically involuntarily urinating or defecating (often from fear or shock)—and the involuntary/emotional nuance are not fully predictable from the parts without contextual/pragmatic knowledge, so it is only partly transparent.
Etymology
Soil oneself paints a simple picture: soil means 'to make dirty' and oneself means your own clothes or body, so someone frightened or shocked might literally soil their clothes. That's why the phrase now means 'to wet or dirty your clothes because you lose control of your bladder or bowels'.