douche

See also: douché

English

Etymology

(deprecated template usage)

Borrowed from French douche (“shower”), from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Italian doccia (“shower”). Sense 3 from douche bag.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /duːʃ/
• Rhymes: -uːʃ

• Audio (UK):

  (file)

Noun

douche (plural douches)

1. A jet or current of water or vapour directed upon some part of the body to benefit it medicinally; in particular, such a jet directed at the vagina for vaginal irrigation.
   • 1892 Robert Ottiwell Gifford-Bennet, Buxton and its Medicinal Waters, London: John Heywood, [1]

     Massage, or kneading of the whole body, is carried out in this bath after which a steam douche or a warm spray is turned upon the affected parts, according to the nature of the case.

   • 1898 Selma Lagerlöf (trans. Pauline Bancroft Flach), The Story of Gösta Berling, Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, Part II, Chapter I, p. 249 [2]

     Earth, the great mother, begins to live. Romping like a child she rises from her bath in the spring floods, from her douche in the spring rain.

   • 1973 Jaroslav Hašek (trans. Cecil Parrott), The Good Soldier Švejk, London: William Heinemann, Chapter 4, p. 32,

     In the bathroom they immersed him in a tub of warm water, and then pulled him out and put him under a cold douche.

2. Something that produces the jet or current in the previous sense, such as a syringe.
3. (slang, derogatory) A contemptible person; a worthless, brainless or disgusting person (earlier douche bag).
   • 1991 Anthrax, "Startin' Up a Posse", from album Attack of the Killer B's (song lyrics)

     You say our records are offensive, (You're a douche, you're a douche.)

Derived terms

Derived terms

• douche bag, douchebag
• douchelord

• douche nozzle/douche-nozzle
• douchy

Related terms

• doos

Translations

a jet or current of water or vapour directed upon some part of the body to benefit it medicinally

• Arabic: حَمَام (ar) m (ḥamām)

  Egyptian Arabic: دوش m (dōšš)

• Bulgarian: душ (bg) m (duš)
• Czech: sprcha (cs) f
• Finnish: suihku (fi)
• French: douche (fr) f, douche vaginale f
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• German: Dusche (de) f
• Greek: ντους (el) n (ntous)
• Portuguese: duche (pt) m, (Brazil) ducha (pt) f
• Russian: душ (ru) m (duš)
• Spanish: ducha (es) f

a syringe

• Catalan: clister m, ènema m, clisteri m
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 噴射器／喷射器 (zh) (pēnshèqì), 喷射器 (zh) (pēnshèqì), 灌水器 (guànshuǐqì)

• Czech: stříkačka (cs) f
• Finnish: ruisku (fi), lääkeruisku
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• French: poire de lavement f
• Russian: спринцо́вка (ru) f (sprincóvka)
• Spanish: jeringa (es) f

jerk, idiot — see douchebag

Verb

1. To administer a douche to; to shower; to douse
   • 1926, D. H. Lawrence, The Plumed Serpent, New York: Knopf, Chapter II,

     […] a frizzy half-white woman who looked as if she had fallen into a flour-sack, her face was so deep in powder, and her frizzy hair and her brown silk dress so douched with the white dust of it.

   • 1938, Xavier Herbert, Capricornia, Chapter VI, p. 81, [3]

     Mrs. McLash's anger was gone completely, douched not nearly so much by the beer as by this attention to her son.

   • 1992, Edna O'Brien, Time and Tide, New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, Chapter 9, p. 66,

     The boxes would reek of the smell of rich plum cake, with brandy or sherry douched over it.

   • 2007, Valerie Allen, On Farting: Language and Laughter in the Middle Ages, New York: Palgrave MacMillan, p. 153,

     Tragedy acts then like a laxative […] or an aperient […] to douche our systems of humors and emotions that unbalance the soul, so that we may return to the virtuous golden mean, to homeostatic equilibrium.

2. To use a douche.

Translations

to use a douche

• French: doucher (fr)
• German: spülen (de)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Portuguese: duchar (pt)

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Dutch

Etymology

(deprecated template usage)

Borrowed from French douche (“shower”), from Italian doccia (“shower”). See also does (“shower head”).

Pronunciation

• Audio:

  (file)

Noun

douche m or f (plural douches, diminutive doucheje n)

1. shower

Verb

douche

1. (deprecated template usage) (archaic) singular present subjunctive of douchen

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French

Etymology

Borrowed from Italian doccia.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /duʃ/

• audio:

  (file)

Noun

douche f (plural douches)

1. shower
2. (juggling) shower

Verb

douche

1. first-person singular present indicative of doucher
2. third-person singular present indicative of doucher
3. first-person singular present subjunctive of doucher
4. third-person singular present subjunctive of doucher
5. second-person singular imperative of doucher

Related terms

• doucher
• douchette

Descendants

• Albanian: dush
• Arabic: دوش
• Belarusian: душ (duš)
• Bulgarian: душ (duš)
• Catalan: dutxa
• Dutch: douche
• English: douche
• Estonian: dušš
• Friulian: duše
• German: Dusche
• Greek: ντους (dous)
• Hungarian: tus
• Latvian: duša

• Lithuanian: dušas
• Norwegian: dusj
• Occitan: docha
• Persian: دوش
• Romanian: duș
• Russian: душ m (duš)
• Serbo-Croatian: tuš
• Slovene: tuš
• Spanish: ducha
• Swedish: dusch
• Turkish: duş
• Ukrainian: душ (duš)

See also

• bain

Derived terms

• douche vaginale

Further reading

• “douche”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

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Norman

Etymology

Borrowed from French douche, from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Italian doccia.

Noun

douche f (plural douches)

1. (Jersey) shower