turtle's head

9.9

Feeling an urgent need to poop

noun

Offensive

: tener ganas de cagar

I really need to find a bathroom; I feel like my turtle's head is poking out!

Examples

Suddenly, he announced he had a turtle's head and sprinted to the bathroom.
When the meeting dragged on, Tom joked he was getting a turtle's head and needed a break.
She whispered to her friend that she had a turtle's head, causing them both to giggle.
When you're in a long meeting, you might feel your turtle's head starting to emerge.
He interrupted the conversation because he suddenly felt he had a turtle's head and had to rush to the restroom.
During the long car ride, she jokingly complained that she could feel her turtle's head making a quick appearance.
In the middle of the lecture, Mark discreetly mentioned to his friend that he was battling a turtle's head.

Antonyms

relief

497 1.0

A feeling of comfort when pain or worry goes away

Surface Forms

turtle's head singular

turtles' heads plural

Morphology

turtle's + head

Although the phrase literally combines 'turtle' + 'head' and evokes an image of something poking out, the specific slang meaning 'an urgent need to defecate' is a culturally specific, euphemistic metaphor that is not predictable from the constituents. A B1 learner who knows the words would likely understand the image but would not reliably infer the bodily/defecation sense without prior exposure.

Etymology

Turtle's head The slang turtle's head comes from the image of a turtle poking its head out of its shell. When the first bit of poop begins to appear it can look like that little head, so people say turtle's head to mean they urgently need to 'poop'.