toothpaste is out of the tube

9.5

A change that cannot be undone or taken back

idiom

Informal

: no hay vuelta atrás

You can't take it back; the toothpaste is out of the tube.

Examples

After the leak, toothpaste is out of the tube—there’s no way to keep the information secret now.
Now that the plan has been announced, toothpaste is out of the tube for the company.
Once her comments went viral, the toothpaste is out of the tube and the situation can't be fixed.
The toothpaste is out of the tube!
After the leak, toothpaste is out of the tube—there’s no way to keep the information secret now.
Now that the plan has been announced, toothpaste is out of the tube for the company.
You can't take it back; the toothpaste is out of the tube.

Synonyms

down the pan

vstoothpaste is out of the tube

1 9.9

Completely ruined or wasted and no longer useful

focuses on permanence of the damage rather than general failure

water over the dam

vstoothpaste is out of the tube

Informal

7.5

Something bad that already happened and cannot be changed so do not worry about it

emphasizes that the change is final and cannot be undone

Antonyms

reversible

14 3.9

Can change back to an earlier state

fixable

9 2.7

Can be repaired or put right

Surface Forms

toothpaste is out of the tube main

Morphology

toothpaste + be + out + of + the + tube

The phrase relies on a concrete physical image (once toothpaste is squeezed out of a tube it cannot easily be returned) so a learner who knows the constituent words can plausibly infer the idea of irreversibility. However, the meaning is a metaphorical extension of the literal scene and requires pragmatic mapping or prior exposure to be fully understood, so it is not fully transparently compositional.

Etymology

Toothpaste is out of the tube comes from the simple image of a squeezed tube: once the toothpaste is out of the tube, you cannot put it back in. So, the phrase means something 'irreversible' or 'cannot be undone'.