mollycoddle
Americannoun
verb (used with object)
-
mollycoddles,
present (3rd person singular)
-
mollycoddled,
past participle, past
-
mollycoddling
present participle
verb
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
mollycoddlesimple
-
mollycoddlessimple
-
have mollycoddledperfect
-
has mollycoddledperfect
-
am mollycoddlingprogressive
-
are mollycoddlingprogressive
-
is mollycoddlingprogressive
-
have been mollycoddlingperfect progressive
-
has been mollycoddlingperfect progressive
Past
-
mollycoddledsimple
-
had mollycoddledperfect
-
was mollycoddlingprogressive
-
were mollycoddlingprogressive
-
had been mollycoddlingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of mollycoddle
First recorded in 1825–35; Molly (a female name used in the sense “effeminate man”) + coddle
Explanation
Mollycoddle means to spoil or overindulge something. You can think of mollycoddle as an extreme form of coddle. If you constantly fuss over your dog and serve her homemade food while she's resting on a soft feather bed, you mollycoddle her. Mollycoddle began as a noun describing a man who pampered or indulged himself too much. When applied to men, Molly, the woman's name, was a slur meaning "too feminine." No longer just for men, the verb mollycoddle describes any kind of excessively indulgent or overprotective treatment. A coach may mollycoddle his star player by planning practice around his schedule, or you may mollycoddle your little sister by doing her homework for her when she says she's tired.
Vocabulary lists containing mollycoddle
The Downstairs Girl
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Spooked
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Savvy
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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.
See Examples For:
The feat followed trial and error that initially saw him mollycoddle corals in stress-free environments, but those easily perished in the ocean once transplanted.
From Barron's ● Jul. 29, 2026
For all the female agency on display, Barbie still has to placate and mollycoddle the insecure Ken.
From Salon ● Jul. 19, 2023
Molly Roberts, true to her name, didn’t mollycoddle the baby boomer generation in her Nov. 6 Wednesday Opinion column, “OK, boomer. The kids are fighting back.”
From Washington Post ● Nov. 8, 2019
That may annoy European bankers, but is hardly a reason to mollycoddle them.
From Economist ● Oct. 15, 2015
A note in the Irving-version states that Capulet is a meddlesome mollycoddle not unlike Polonius.
From Shakespeare in the Theatre by William Poel
Were its ballplayers men or New Age mollycoddles?
From Time Magazine Archive
So, you see, the picture as you paint it gives us credit for being real hemen, when as a matter of fact we have degenerated into a bunch of mollycoddles.
From Time Magazine Archive
It is not to be intimated that the Bostonians were mollycoddles.
From Mormon Settlement in Arizona A Record of Peaceful Conquest of the Desert by James H. McClintock
Besides, I don't want them to grow up spoiled mollycoddles.
From Where the Blue Begins by Christopher Morley
In practice what happens is that parents notice that boys brought up at home become mollycoddles, or prigs, or duffers, unable to take care of themselves.
From Treatise on Parents and Children by Bernard Shaw
His passion for her grows to such a pitch that he starts bounding up stairs instead of crawling over them like a mollycoddled toddler.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 16, 2024
I went from my parents’ mollycoddled child to an adult that had to do their own laundry.
From The Verge ● Aug. 8, 2022
“I don’t think we can be mollycoddled to live in a bubble the whole time.”
From Washington Post ● Jul. 19, 2021
One of the great things about being in a group is also the worst thing about being in a group: You’re very mollycoddled, you’re encouraged to escape reality.
From Salon ● Feb. 10, 2017
Miss Gray will have to be mollycoddled, and grandmothered, and what-not.
From Ruth Fielding in Moving Pictures Or, Helping the Dormitory Fund by Alice B. Emerson
You’d think businesses wouldn’t require a lot of mollycoddling when it came to defining abusive behavior.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 21, 2021
While perhaps whimsical in premise, it was not an exercise in mollycoddling.
From New York Times ● Mar. 19, 2021
I took refuge in what the club calls the press building, a recently constructed Taj Mahal of media mollycoddling.
From The New Yorker ● Jun. 14, 2019
Once we established trust and the connection between each other, he didn't need any mollycoddling and neither did I. And that's what you want.
From The Guardian ● Jan. 18, 2013
“But what I say is, too much cuddling and mollycoddling isn’t good for that boy of yours, or anybody else’s boy.”
From The Prairie Child by Ward. E. F. (Edmund Franklin)
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.
