Recovering

How to spell recovering

10 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce recovering

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does recovering mean?

1. verbIn the process of returning to good health, strength, or a normal state after illness or difficulty.
2. verbIn the process of getting back something lost, taken, or owed.

Recovering in a sentence

• She is still recovering from her knee surgery and walks with a cane.

• The divers spent the morning recovering wreckage from the seabed.

• The patient is recovering well and should be discharged within days.

• The firm is slowly recovering the money owed by former clients.

Where does recovering come from?

Language of origin: French

This is the present participle of 'recover', which English took from the Anglo-Norman and Old French 'recovrer' during the 1300s. That French verb descended from the Latin 'recuperare', meaning 'to get back' or 'to regain', built from 're-' ('back, again') and a root tied to 'recipere' ('to take in'). The Latin original is also the direct ancestor of the more formal English word 'recuperate', so the two are essentially cousins from the same source. The everyday sense of regaining health and the older sense of getting back something lost both sit comfortably inside the modern word. The single 'c' and single 'v' are worth noting, since the transparent 're-' + 'cover' spelling keeps it from being a serious trap.

How the word is built

• re- (back, again)
• cover (root, from Latin recuperare: to regain)
• -ing (present participle/gerund suffix)