on pins and needles

1. In a state of anxiety or tense expectation: “Jackie was on pins and needles waiting to hear about her job application.”

Idioms and Phrases

Nervously anxious, as in He was on pins and needles, waiting for the test results. The graphic expression pins and needles for the tingling sensation experienced in recovering from numbness was transferred to a feeling of marked mental uneasiness about 1800.

Example Sentences

“Everybody was on pins and needles,” the counselor said at the hearing.

From Salon

Although the Mossad’s intelligence and the Israel Defense Forces’ rapid establishment of air superiority inside Iran proved to be nothing less than extraordinary, my wife and I lived on pins and needles for those first few days of the war.

From Los Angeles Times

Since Trump’s takeover, Kennedy Center watchers have been on pins and needles about what the schedule might look like.

From Los Angeles Times

"We're all on pins and needles and have been anxiously sitting by our phones, staring at the TV, having the radio going - trying to stay as informed as possible because there wasn't a good system in place," said Ms Alvarez-Petit, who lives in West Los Angeles.

From BBC

"Unlike the strong, determined character in Stephen King’s novel, Wendy in the film version fears Jack’s violent temper, which threatens to explode at any moment. Duvall’s Wendy lives in constant dread, perhaps unconsciously so, of Jack’s emotional and physical outbursts — and so she spends most of the film on pins and needles."

From Salon

Related Words

• anxious 
• apprehensive 
• edgy 
• excitable 
• fidgety 
• jumpy 
• panicky www.thesaurus.com
• restless 
• shaky 
• skittish 
• spooked www.thesaurus.com
• tense 
• uneasy 
• uptight