distend
Americanverb (used with or without object)
verb
-
to expand or be expanded by or as if by pressure from within; swell; inflate
-
(tr) to stretch out or extend
-
(tr) to magnify in importance; exaggerate
Related Words
See expand.
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of distend
First recorded in 1375–1425; late Middle English distenden (from Anglo-French destendre ), from Latin distendere, equivalent to dis- dis- 1 + tendere “to stretch”
Explanation
A soda and pizza binge might make your stomach distend, meaning your stomach will swell as a result of pressure from the inside. If you’ve ever eaten too much food it won’t surprise you to learn that the verb distend traces back to the Latin words dis-, meaning “apart,” and tendere, meaning “to stretch.” Your stomach will certainly feel stretched out if you do something — like overeat — that causes it to distend. The word distend often applies to stomachs — a pregnancy would also cause a stomach to distend — but it can also refer to anything that is stretched out as a result of internal pressure.
Vocabulary lists containing distend
The Vocabulary.com Top 1000
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100 SAT Words Beginning with "D"
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"Once Upon a Time," Vocabulary from the short story
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Pregnancy is a wonder, even through the finale when a parent pushes their newborns into the world, and those tiny humans distend the most intimate parts of their bodies.
From Salon • Nov. 9, 2025
Its body seemed to distend, its muscles to melt.
From The New Yorker • Feb. 11, 2019
Like dispatches from another dimension, Katz’s drawings distend the ordinary geometry of the comics page, much as desire contorts the imagination.
From Slate • Mar. 30, 2018
Does the league really want to so distend its compensation scale for any commissioner, much less this one?
From Washington Post • Nov. 14, 2017
When a man falls upon his knees and grieves, doth not his musculature contract and his ligaments distend?
From "The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume I: The Pox Party" by M.T. Anderson
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
