flat on one's back
Idioms-
Sick in bed. For example, The flu has put her flat on her back .
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Helpless, without recourse, defeated, as in I wish I could help but the recession has put me flat on my back .
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.
This necessitates lying flat on one's back in the clear narrow space between smoke and flooring, or being suffocated—a minor inconvenience as compared with others in Persian travel.
From A Ride to India across Persia and Baluchistán by Harry De Windt
It was said in some book of travel that one might see twenty-four miles in any direction from Ribe, lying flat on one's back; but that was drawing the long bow.
From The Making of an American by Jacob A. (Jacob August) Riis
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.
