go off the deep end

Cultural  

1. To act recklessly or hysterically: “The students were behaving themselves at the party, but then a couple of kids started to go off the deep end.”

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go off the deep end Idioms  

1. Become unduly excited, overwrought, or angry. For example, When he heard about John's smashing into his car, he went off the deep end . [c. 1920] Also see in deep , def. 2.

2. Be irrationally carried away, act irresponsibly or heedlessly. For example, Just because you like her looks doesn't mean you should go off the deep end and propose . [c. 1920] In both of these colloquial usages deep end alludes to the deep end of a swimming pool.

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

go off the deep end

“People have problems, but you don’t expect them to go off the deep end like that,” Letarte said.

From Washington Times ● Oct. 27, 2023

Her untimely death prompts a heartbroken Padraic to go off the deep end.

From Washington Post ● Mar. 1, 2023

"And most people, doctors, friends, most of everyone would have said, 'Well, yeah, she had every right to go off the deep end and just lose it.'"

From Fox News ● Feb. 27, 2020

He probably senses she’s about to go off the deep end, I suggest, and Adichie smiles to acknowledge how impossible she is.

From The Guardian ● Mar. 4, 2017

It was the most logical, easiest, and simplest way for a D-H reactor to go off the deep end.

From The Bramble Bush by Schelling, George Luther

Related Words

• freak out
• go off
• lose it