The Collaborative International Dictionary
Distressful \Dis*tress"ful\, a.
Full of distress; causing, indicating, or attended with,
distress; as, a distressful situation. ``Some distressful
stroke.''
--Shak. ``Distressful cries.''
--Pope.
Syn: distressing. [1913 Webster] -- Dis*tress"ful*ly, adv.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1590s, from distress + -ful. Related: Distressfully; distressfulness.
Wiktionary
a. Causing or having distress, strain, or anxiety. alt. Causing or having distress, strain, or anxiety.
WordNet
adj. causing distress or worry or anxiety; "distressing (or disturbing) news"; "lived in heroic if something distressful isolation"; "a disturbing amount of crime"; "a revelation that was most perturbing"; "a new and troubling thought"; "in a particularly worrisome predicament"; "a worrying situation"; "a worrying time" [syn: distressing, disturbing, perturbing, troubling, worrisome, worrying]
Usage examples of "distressful".
Be ye comforted in this, distressful rogues, the shorter our life the less we sin, the which is a fair, good thing.
Adelaide Churchill, saw that something distressful was happening at the Borden house.
This lake had an Indian name which, though grantedly barbaric in sound to the average English-speaker, in her special case presented such an impassable block both in speech and in mental pre-speech imagery (for some obscure reason, Freudian perhaps, or else simply an instinctive retreat from something with distressful connotations) that she gave up trying to say it and it became simply "the lake.