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Sigh vs Wheeze - What's the difference?

sigh | wheeze |

As nouns the difference between sigh and wheeze

is that sigh is a deep and prolonged audible inspiration or respiration of air, as when fatigued, frustrated, grieved, or relieved; the act of sighing while wheeze is a piping or whistling sound caused by difficult respiration.

As verbs the difference between sigh and wheeze

is that sigh is to inhale a larger quantity of air than usual, and immediately expel it; to make a deep single audible respiration, especially as the result or involuntary expression of fatigue, exhaustion, grief, sorrow, frustration, or the like while wheeze is to breathe hard, and with an audible piping or whistling sound, as persons affected with asthma.

As an interjection sigh

is an expression of fatigue, exhaustion, grief, sorrow, frustration, or the like, often used in casual written contexts.

sigh

English

Noun

(en noun)
  • A deep and prolonged audible inspiration or respiration of air, as when fatigued, frustrated, grieved, or relieved; the act of sighing.
  • Figuratively, a manifestation of grief; a lament.
  • (Cockney rhyming slang) A person who is bored.

    • Verb

    (en verb)
  • To inhale a larger quantity of air than usual, and immediately expel it; to make a deep single audible respiration, especially as the result or involuntary expression of fatigue, exhaustion, grief, sorrow, frustration, or the like.
  • * {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)
    • , chapter=5 citation , passage=A waiter brought his aperitif, which was a small scotch and soda, and as he sipped it gratefully he sighed .
       ‘Civilized,’ he said to Mr. Campion. ‘Humanizing.’ […] ‘Cigars and summer days and women in big hats with swansdown face-powder, that's what it reminds me of.’}}
  • To lament; to grieve.
  • * Bible, Mark viii. 12
    • He sighed deeply in his spirit.
  • To utter sighs over; to lament or mourn over.
  • To experience an emotion associated with sighing.
  • To make a sound like sighing.
  • * Coleridge
    • And the coming wind did roar more loud, / And the sails did sigh like sedge.
  • * Tennyson
    • The winter winds are wearily sighing .
  • To exhale (the breath) in sighs.
  • * Shakespeare
    • Never man sighed truer breath.
  • To express by sighs; to utter in or with sighs.
  • * Shakespeare
    • They sighed forth proverbs.
  • * Hoole
    • The gentle swain sighs back her grief.
  • (archaic) To utter sighs over; to lament or mourn over.
  • * Prior
    • Ages to come, and men unborn, / Shall bless her name, and sigh her fate.

    Interjection

    (en interjection)
  • An expression of fatigue, exhaustion, grief, sorrow, frustration, or the like, often used in casual written contexts.
    • Sigh , I'm so bored at work today.

    Anagrams

    *

    wheeze

    English

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A piping or whistling sound caused by difficult respiration.
  • An ordinary whisper exaggerated so as to produce the hoarse sound known as the "stage whisper"; a forcible whisper with some admixture of tone.
  • (British, slang) An ulterior scheme or plan
  • * 2011 " Road rage; High petrol prices hurt, but will not throttle the economy", The Economist 19 November 2011:
    • The main point of fuel duty, though, is as a fiscal wheeze : it made up 5% of the tax take in 2010.
  • (slang) Something very humorous or laughable.
    • The new comedy is a wheeze .
    You think you're going to win? That's a real wheeze !

    Synonyms

    * See also

    Verb

  • To breathe hard, and with an audible piping or whistling sound, as persons affected with asthma.
  • * 2001 , (Fourth Estate, paperback edition, 443)
    • If the air smelled even faintly of dog, Lionel coughed, wheezed and sneezed.