wheeze

Meanings

Verb

• To breathe hard, and with an audible piping or whistling sound, as persons affected with asthma.
• To convulse with laughter; to become breathless due to intense laughing.
• To make a sound that resembles the sound of human wheezing.

Noun

• A piping or whistling sound caused by difficult respiration.
• An ordinary whisper exaggerated so as to produce the hoarse sound known as the "stage whisper"; a forcible whisper with some admixture of tone.
• An ulterior scheme or plan
• Something very humorous or laughable.
• A sound that resembles a human wheezing.

Origin

• From Middle English whesen, perhaps from Old Norse hvæsa, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ḱwes-.