waste away


Lose energy and vigor, become enfeebled and weak, as in She was wasting away before our eyes. [Late 1300s]

The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.

How to use waste away in a sentence

  • Perhaps it's his bringin' up; but he sickens day by day, And he doesn't take no food, and I'm seein' him waste away.

  • If any one group is over-used there will come a time when they will begin to waste away.

  • For wise Zeus ordained that he should live for three generations of mortal men and not waste away with old age.

  • He would believe himself sincere and in the end his resolution would waste away into procrastination and specious excuses.

    A Pagan of the Hills | Charles Neville Buck
  • It is not allowed to waste away, however much the constituent parts of it may shift.