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cabin fever

/ˈkæbən ˈfivər/
IPA guide

When you're stuck in a small or isolated place for so long that you start to feel restless and anxious, you've got cabin fever.

You may vote for a Disney World vacation instead of risking cabin fever at your family's remote cottage in the woods. There's also a more serious version of cabin fever, when someone is incarcerated in a small cell, trapped in a submarine, snowed in for days, or otherwise physically unable to get outside and breathe fresh air. Cabin fever was used this way by the early 20th century; earlier, the term referred to the bacterial disease typhus.

Definitions of cabin fever
  1. noun
    a state or feeling of boredom and annoyance from being indoors too long
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