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• cachexia •

Pronunciation: kê-kek-si-ê • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Noun, mass

Meaning: Physical or mental wasting, withering, debility caused by malnutrition or chronic illness, like anorexia or cancer.

Notes: Cachexia (cachec-sia) comes with an adjective, cachectic. We also have an old Anglicized version of this word, cachexy, discussed all over the web, extended to refer to politics and morality, but not actually used since the 19th century. Since this word is of Greek origin, the CH, originally like the CH in Scots English loch and German sprechen, is pronounced [k] in regular English.

In Play: Today this word is encountered mostly in medical documents: "Leonard's treatment for cachexia was so successful it led to obesity." But I have recommended rescuing useful vocabulary from medicine many times before. So, since cachexia is in current use, I propose we extend its sense to cover the hole left in the English vocabulary by the loss of cachexy: "A pandemic should not befall a nation when the state of its government can only be described as cachexia (cachectic)."

Word History: English borrowed this word whole from Latin cachexia, which borrowed it from Greek kakhexia, comprising kako- "bad" + hexis "body habit, condition", the noun from ekhein "to have, hold, keep". Greek came upon its word by way of Proto-Indo-European segh- "to hold", source also of Greek skhola "leisure", borrowed by Latin as schola "leisure for intellectual conversation", which English borrowed as school. German Sieg "victory", as in Sieg Heil! "Hail victory!" came from the same PIE source via the Germanic route. It also underlies hector. (Now it's time to thank our well-known friend, George Kovac of Miami, Florida, who feared this gem of a Good Word might wither away from disuse.)

Subscribers to the Doctor's Word of the Day at αlphaDictionary and the regulars at the αgora need not worry about mental cachexia.

I hope you are right Slava. The mental stimulation afforded here is a great blessing.

So is it better to have a sound mind in a decrepit body, or a withered mind in a fit body?

David: What a question! I hope and pray my body and mind stay active until the Lord calls me Home. I have experienced a stroke with complete aphasia. This took years to overcome and some of it still lingers. I have been unable to write [with a pen], find my mouth with a spoon full of food or bring a cup to my lips. I have had near fatal sepsis and serious cancer. I still have panic attacks and severe agoraphobia. I can walk and I tend a garden but it is severely painful. With all this I believe I have succeeded in many worthwhile ways. I am still here by the grace of God. I do not know what the future holds.

Wow! That is an impressive medical history. We are honoured to have you still with us. But do keep away from that there Covid thing. We should continue to enjoy you for some time to come

COVID19 mention duly noted. I follow the medical experts not the in-your-face deniers.

Philip,

I had a double bypass with a stent and a subdural hematoma. Despite that, I'm in pretty good physical shape. In the spring, summer, fall I tend my garden and do yard work and in the winter try to walk a mile a day.

I think most Agorans are retirees who can remember when language and speech enjoyed more respect than it does today. Our respect for speech is always less on this side of the Atlantic than the other.

I write up these words five days a week. That should help me avoid mental cachexia.

What a physically decrepit bunch we are in this community! Lingering staphylococcus septicemia (later recorded in misguided medical notes as "staff infection"), ruptured appendix, misdiagnosed cellulitis ("no, it's *not* the flu!", but I wasn't believed), cancer, busted femur from not paying attention to glare ice (resulting in a new hip worthy of a skilled structural engineer), to mention only the maladies warranting a hospital stay.

Hospital stays mean boredom. But I was able to have some interesting conversations with a couple of surgeons, who are often so wrapped up in something else that they hardly share the time of day. One of them shared his experience as a resident at Bellevue in NYC, where his alternate assignment was to assess patients on the great ocean liners tied up at the Hudson River piers; his description of being hoisted aboard on a bosun's chair was awesome. The surgeon who installed my new hip joint had to study mechanics, materials, stress analysis, ... I told him he could have been an architect; he had a friend who *did* want to become an architect, but was rejected for that because he couldn't draw -- but he *was* allowed to study mechanical engineering (at MIT).

I may well become physically more decrepit, but if I start to lose my ability to think, and realize that's happening, I hope to come to a swift and peaceful end.

In re: your last paragraph,
Amen! Sistah!