headachyadj.
/ˈhɛdeɪki/, U.S. /ˈhɛdˌeɪki/ Somewhat colloquial.
1. Of a person: suffering from or prone to headache.
ΘΚΠ
the world > health and disease > ill health > pain > pain in specific parts > [adjective] > in head > suffering
headachy1795
heady1872
1795 Lady Newdigate Let. Aug. in A. E. Newdigate-Newdegate Cheverels (1898) xi. 154 Want of sleep..makes me feel Languid & headachy in a Morning.
1796 C. Lamb Let. 30 May in Lett. C. & M. A. Lamb (1975) I. 10 From your afflicted head achey sore throatey humble Servant.
1813 J. Austen Let. 29 Jan. (1995) 202 I was rather head-achey that day, & cd not venture on anything sweet except Jelly.
1897 M. Kingsley Trav. W. Afr. 234 I go, dead tired and still head-achy..with my host.
1950 P. Bowles Let. 18 Mar. in In Touch (1994) 214 Today I feel headachy from my sunburn and fever.
1996 J. C. Oates We were Mulvaneys 406 She was headachey from crying.
2. That causes headache; characterized by or resembling headache.
ΘΚΠ
the world > health and disease > ill health > pain > pain in specific parts > [adjective] > in head > causing
headaching1802
headachy1810
1810 Christian Observer Nov. 703/2 For a head-achy hour..we certainly find him a very amusing and often instructive companion.
1862 G. Rawlinson Five Great Monarchies I. 44 The wine, ‘sweet but headachy’.
1902 Scribner's Mag. Aug. 178/1 A nasty sort of headachy pain began to creep up the back of his head.
?1934 J. Thurber Lett. (2002) 168 Take the piece I am sending back, unrewritten, about the sizes of liquor bottles. Jesus, what a horrible, headachy, sonofabitch that is!
1943 W. Stegner Big Rock Candy Mountain v. 268 The kitchen was headachy with the barroom smell of rye slopped from the keg.
1994 H. Dunmore Burning Bright (1995) vii. 54 She's always tired after hours in the cinema's headachy darkness.
Derivatives
ˈheadachiness n. the state of suffering from or being prone to headache.
ΘΚΠ
the world > health and disease > ill health > pain > pain in specific parts > [noun] > in head
headwarkeOE
headacheOE
headachinga1400
sodac1540
sood1547
a sore (Sc. sair) headc1550
raging1561
cephalalgy1607
head1783
splitter1860
headachiness1862
1862 ‘G. Eliot’ Let. 1 May (1956) IV. 28 In a moment of feverish headachiness I transgressed my own rule.
1903 B. Abrahams in W. H. Allchin Man. of Med. 402 A similar feeling of depression, headachiness, etc., is often experienced when the barometer is low.
2011 J. Barth Every Third Thought i. 28 His very slight headachiness dissipated.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2013; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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adj.1795