Off your rocker
Suggest a CorrectionMeaning
Behaving or thinking in a way the speaker considers wildly irrational or absurd. Informal and insulting when directed at a person. It should not be used as a description of mental illness, cognitive impairment, or age-related change. Regional use: Recorded in Britain and now understood more widely.
Origin
Off one's rocker is recorded in British English from the 1890s and was established in print in the early 20th century. Rocker may suggest a rocking chair or a mechanical part from which something has slipped, and the near-contemporary off one's trolley may have influenced it, but the original image is not securely identified. Stories specifically about elderly people falling from chairs or patients rocking in institutions are conjecture rather than documented history.
Research Sources
Variants
- Off one's rocker
Usage Examples
- You must be off your rocker if you expect one battery to power the building all week.
- The newspaper portrayed the inventor as brilliant but slightly off his rocker.
- She rejected the suggestion that anyone opposing the scheme was off their rocker.