Showing results for "throbbing"

• present participle of throb.

throbbing

American  

[throb-ing] / ˈθrɒb ɪŋ /

adjective

1. beating or pulsing rapidly or forcefully, as the heart under the influence of emotion or excitement.

   One may use a sweet, patient tone and words, but the throbbing vein in the temple betrays one’s anger.

2. feeling or exhibiting strong emotion or passion.

   As he spoke to the students crashing the climate convention, he was clearly thrilled to be there in that throbbing mass of youthful exuberance.

3. pulsating or vibrating regularly.

   The throbbing sound was now at full volume, and it was indeed drums—deep, heavy goatskin drums.

4. being or feeling pain that occurs in rhythmic waves or bursts.

   A sinus infection often results in a throbbing headache.

   He pounded on the closed door, but with no effect apart from a throbbing fist.

5. full of or characterized by lively energy.

   This throbbing metropolis is also the world capital of salsa.

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noun

• throbbings
  plural

1. the act of beating fast or forcefully, pulsating or vibrating, or occurring in rhythmic waves.

   The pain in his shoulder had subsided to a dull throbbing.

   Astronomers have measured the throbbing of a sun-like star 24 light-years away.

2. the act or fact of feeling or exhibiting strong emotion or passion.

   The throbbing of my rage was so powerful that the ground trembled.

3. lively energy.

   Feel the throbbing of the world’s cultures at the annual international festival this weekend!

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• unthrobbing
  adjective
• throbbingly
  adverb

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• throbbings
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of throbbing

First recorded in 1400–50; throb ( def. ) + -ing ² ( def. ) for the adjective senses; throb ( def. ) + -ing ¹ ( def. ) for the noun senses

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Explanation

If something's pulsing like a heartbeat, it's throbbing. When you stop and catch your breath after a long run, you might hear your throbbing pulse in your ears. An injury that's throbbing with pain pounds with regular beats: "I have a throbbing headache." Music is often described as throbbing too, beating and pounding with deep bass notes from a club or a car — or maybe your ceiling is vibrating with the throbbing music your upstairs neighbors are playing. To throb is to pulsate, and experts guess the word itself stems from the sound and feeling of pulsating blood.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

throbbing throbbings

So what to do about your underwhelming past lovers, your Pisces Venusian yearning, your throbbing heart, your efforts to prepare yourself to love from the most whole place you possibly can?

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 13, 2026

She told me I may see her third eye throbbing there when she entered her trance.

From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 8, 2025

On the second track, “Bumpy,” what sounds like a sonic rendering of an exploding box of crayons leads to a throbbing pulse that could be a sentient computer’s ticking heart.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 18, 2025

Researchers here are developing the extraordinarily sounding "organ-on-a-chip" technology, conjuring up alarming images of throbbing brains and beating hearts sitting on top of electronic circuits.

From BBC ● Nov. 11, 2025

And then I burrow into the blankets, situating the ice against my throbbing knee, a tight breath hissing between my teeth.

From "The Sea in Winter" by Christine Day

So complete the stillness, so dead the very air, the throbbings of her pulses filled the girl with a suffocating sense of her own vitality.

From The Lady of the Mount by Frederic Stewart Isham

Go, then, my son, and still the wild throbbings of thy heart over the silent beds of those who wake no more till the resurrection morn.

From Olive Leaves Or, Sketches of Character by L. H. (Lydia Howard) Sigourney

As for herself—she was innocent as the linnet that sang beside her in the broom, and innocent was she to be up to the last throbbings of her religious heart.

From Recreations of Christopher North, Volume I (of 2) by John Lyde Wilson

Now it hurries again, as if these were its last throbbings, which it would fain beat out rapidly.

From The Dramatic Works of G. E. Lessing Miss Sara Sampson, Philotas, Emilia Galotti, Nathan the Wise by Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

Then where could Marjory go, in the midst of this confusion of gaiety?—where, as the poet says, "weep her woes" in secret, and listen to the throbbings of a broken heart?

From Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume 21 by Alexander Leighton

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