Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun One who worries excessively and needlessly.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A person who worries excessively, especially about unimportant matters.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun thinks about unfortunate things that might happen

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Attested 1956, I. BELKNAP Human Problems of State Mental Hospitals x. 177 In cartoon Out Our Way by J. R. Williams, there is a character by that name. Earlier examples from newspapers of the 1930s and 1940s.

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Examples

  • And yesterday, Sunday, I lamented that going to the movies has become much less of a pleasure for me these days and more of an exercise in worrywart-ism.

    Lance Mannion: 2010

  • And yesterday, Sunday, I lamented that going to the movies has become much less of a pleasure for me these days and more of an exercise in worrywart-ism.

    The Mannionville Week in Review 2010

  • Michael's romance with Pam's mother lasted as long as the writers needed it to, and this current worrywart of bankruptcy claims will be swept under the rug next issue ...

    The Office is going limp; or "That's what she said!" pabba 2009

  • Will you stop being such a worrywart about your homework?

    Family Storms 2011

  • This very same worrywart imparted advice to never order spicy tuna.

    Susan Orlins: A Week in New York: Lessons Learned, Worries Amassed Susan Orlins 2011

  • It also seems clear to our worrywart that the tenor of the global economic recovery is undergoing a bit of change here, and not for the better unfortunately.

    Dan Dorfman: The Return of the Brothers Grimm Dan Dorfman 2011

  • Still, even that slim of a chance could be slightly disconcerting seeing that the pesky asteroid that hit the Earth 250 million years ago was likely the cause of 90 percent of life on the planet dying off also, as a worrywart points out to me, those are better odds than winning the lottery.

    Doomsday Apophis asteroid? Could the Earth be on a collision course? Melissa Bell 2011

  • Not just for 10 minutes and I wonder, among other things, how I'll fill the void of not having those talks after she dies assuming she predeceases me, a worrywart can never be too sure.

    Susan Orlins: Choosing My Parents Susan Orlins 2011

  • Ed Helms, who played the worrywart dentist in "The Hangover," is Tim Lippe, an insurance agent in small-town Wisconsin.

    'Gnomeo': A Bard's Garden of Delights Joe Morgenstern 2011

  • Will you stop being such a worrywart about your homework?

    Family Storms 2011

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