A.Word.A.Day--dysthymia

[msesheta]

Wordsmith.org

The Magic of Words

Jan 11, 2012

This week's theme
Words coined using combining forms

This week's words
duopsony
hypochondriac
dysthymia

A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg

dysthymia

PRONUNCIATION:

(dis-THY-mee-uh)

MEANING:

noun: A mild depression.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Greek dys- (bad) + -thymia (mental disorder), from thymos (mind, soul). Earliest documented use: 1842.

USAGE:

"It was as if my mood had been goaded away from situational discontentedness into a dysthymia that seemed now to be heading into full-fledged depression."
Meghan Daum; Life Would Be Perfect If I Lived in That House; Knopf; 2011.

Explore "dysthymia" in the Visual Thesaurus.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

There is something beautiful about all scars of whatever nature. A scar means the hurt is over, the wound is closed and healed, done with. -Harry Crews, novelist and playwright (b. 1935)


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