bottle up

phrasal verb

bottled up; bottling up; bottles up

: to keep (a feeling or emotion) inside instead of expressing it : to hide (a feeling or emotion)

She's kept her feelings about the accident bottled up for too long.

I know he's angry, but he bottles it up inside instead of talking to someone about it.

Examples of bottle up in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Root beer and other sodas are costing a little more than last year, with the liter bottle up 2% but that is still cheaper than buying the soda by the can. —Betty Lin-Fisher, USA Today, 24 June 2025

The bill died in the House; it was bottled up in a subcommittee headed by Representative Glenn Anderson from Southern California, where opponent Flying Tiger Line is headquartered. —Chase Peterson-Withorn, Forbes.com, 23 June 2025

There’s a fascinating rawness to the way the film portrays Andy that echoes Mia (Sophie Wilde) in Talk to Me, someone who disguised her ravenous neediness with a grin and a joke, all her grief bottled up inside. —Alison Willmore, Vulture, 30 May 2025

Terry Hynes, an attorney specializing in rail infrastructure projects, argued planning issues in particular have bottled up capital investment. —James Bickerton, MSNBC Newsweek, 7 June 2025

Rhymes for bottle up

• buttercup
• backup
• blowup
• breakup
• buildup
• checkup
• cleanup
• holdup
• hookup
• lineup
• lockup
• makeup