Stick In Your (or one’s) Throat

Also:

Stick in your craw.
stick in your gizzard.
Stick in your gullet.

Meaning

Stick in your throat: Refers to something that is impossible to accept or that continues to annoy you; to be unable to say something or to have great difficulty saying it. All the variations are interchangeable but the more colorful variants tend to be used in the former sense, to express irritation at something that causes continual anger, resentment, annoyance, etc.

Examples Of Use

“Marcus taking credit for my idea really sticks in my throat.”

“I broke down and asked my father for money. It really sticks in my throat to ask for his help!”

“What’s wrong with Ma,” asked Jarvis. “Ah, she’s got something or other stuck in her gizzard,” replied Pa.

“I’ve tried to apologize to Glen several times, but the words just stick in my throat.”

“You’ve been moody all day, Terry. I know you’ve got something stuck in your craw, so just spit it out already.”

Origin

In use since the mid-1800’s or earlier, this idiom draws on the literal sense of something being stuck in your throat which you can neither swallow or spit out.

Notes on the variants:

Craw: (crop, croup, ingluvies) Part of a bird’s digestive system, the craw is a pouch near the throat used to store food prior to digestion. Colloquially used to mean throat in humans, it is only used this way today as a variation of the present idiom. This word is frequently identified as a fossil word but it is still used in reference to a bird’s anatomy.

Gizzard: (ventriculus, gastric mill, gigerium) A thick-walled stomach in birds, some reptiles, and fish which is used to grind up food, usually containing small stones or grit. Used colloquially to mean throat in humans.

Gullet: Another word for throat, esophagus, etc.

All of these synonyms for throat are rarely used today and tended to be used more in rural areas.

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