pain Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun a symptom of some physical hurt or disorder
    hurting.
    • the patient developed severe pain and distension
  2. noun emotional distress; a fundamental feeling that people try to avoid
    painfulness.
    • the pain of loneliness
  3. noun a somatic sensation of acute discomfort
    painful sensation; pain sensation.
    • as the intensity increased the sensation changed from tickle to pain
  4. noun a bothersome annoying person
    pain in the neck; nuisance.
    • that kid is a terrible pain
  5. noun something or someone that causes trouble; a source of unhappiness
    annoyance; pain in the ass; infliction; bother; botheration; pain in the neck.
    • washing dishes was a nuisance before we got a dish washer
    • a bit of a bother
    • he's not a friend, he's an infliction
  6. verb cause bodily suffering to and make sick or indisposed
    ail; trouble.
  7. verb cause emotional anguish or make miserable
    anguish; hurt.
    • It pains me to see my children not being taught well in school

WordNet

Pain noun
Etymology
OE. peine, F. peine, fr. L. poena, penalty, punishment, torment, pain; akin to Gr. penalty. Cf. Penal, Pine to languish, Punish.
Definitions
  1. Punishment suffered or denounced; suffering or evil inflicted as a punishment for crime, or connected with the commission of a crime; penalty. Chaucer.
    We will, by way of mulct or pain, lay it upon him. Bacon.
    Interpose, on pain of my displeasure. Dryden.
    None shall presume to fly, under pain of death. Addison.
  2. Any uneasy sensation in animal bodies, from slight uneasiness to extreme distress or torture, proceeding from a derangement of functions, disease, or injury by violence; bodily distress; bodily suffering; an ache; a smart. "The pain of Jesus Christ." Chaucer. ✍ Pain may occur in any part of the body where sensory nerves are distributed, and it is always due to some kind of stimulation of them. The sensation is generally referred to the peripheral end of the nerve.
  3. pl. Specifically, the throes or travail of childbirth.
    She bowed herself and travailed, for her pains came upon her. 1 Sam. iv. 19.
  4. Uneasiness of mind; mental distress; disquietude; anxiety; grief; solicitude; anguish. Chaucer.
    In rapture as in pain. Keble.
  5. See Pains, labor, effort.
Pain transitive verb
Etymology
OE. peinen, OF. pener, F. peiner to fatigue. See Pain, n.
Wordforms
imperfect & past participle Pained ; present participle & verbal noun Paining
Definitions
  1. To inflict suffering upon as a penalty; to punish. Obs. Wyclif (Acts xxii. 5).
  2. To put to bodily uneasiness or anguish; to afflict with uneasy sensations of any degree of intensity; to torment; to torture; as, his dinner or his wound pained him; his stomach pained him.
    Excess of cold, as well as heat, pains us. Lock
  3. To render uneasy in mind; to disquiet; to distress; to grieve; as a child's faults pain his parents.
    I am pained at m very heart. Jer. iv. 19.
    Chaucer. Syn. -- To disquiet; trouble; afflict; grieve; aggrieve; distress; agonize; torment; torture.

Webster 1913