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Glite Dictionary
to kill oneself

to kill oneself

9 8.1
To work too hard and make yourself very tired or sick
  • phrasal verb
  • Informal
translation icon : exigirse demasiado
  • If you keep stressing out over every little thing, you'll really be killing yourself.
  • killing yourself trying
  • want to kill yourself

Examples

  • I've been killing myself for eight days and I gained a pound!

    Romy and Michele's High School Reunion (1997)

  • You are killing yourself by working too many hours without a break.

  • But I've watched you almost kill yourself working out, Maks.

    Fiction book (2000)

  • She was killing herself trying to impress her boss with long hours and little sleep.

Synonyms

to overwork
vsto kill oneself
15 4.1

To make someone work too much so they become very tired or ill

is about intense single efforts more than ongoing excessive work
to overexert oneself
vsto kill oneself
3 7.2

Make too much effort with your body or mind so it is unhealthy

is broader, covering long or repeated excessive work as well as extreme effort

Antonyms

to rest
816 1.0

To stop activity to relax or sleep and get energy back

to ease up
57 3.7

To make something less strong or strict

How Hard

to kill oneself
  • Informal
9 8.1
work
∞ 1.0
to try
∞ 1.0

Surface Forms

kill oneself infinitive
killed oneself past
killed oneself past participle
killing oneself present participle
kills oneself third person singular

Morphology

kill + oneself

The literal composition 'kill' + 'oneself' denotes causing one's own death, and the MWE's meaning 'strain or work oneself excessively' is a metaphorical, hyperbolic extension of that literal sense. A B1 learner who knows the constituents will grasp the general idea of extreme self-harm or extreme effort, but the pragmatic sense 'work too hard' is inferable only partially and benefits from prior exposure or context, so it is not fully transparent.

Etymology

Kill oneself comes from a strong image: someone working so hard that the work could kill oneself. So today people say it as an exaggeration to mean 'to work too hard' or 'make an excessive effort'.