give someone heart failure

Idioms and Phrases

Frighten or startle someone very much, as in You nearly gave me heart failure when you told me you were quitting . It is also put as have heart failure , meaning “be frightened or startled,” as in I just about had heart failure when I heard about her accident . These hyperbolic terms allude to the life-threatening physical condition in which the heart fails to pump blood at an adequate rate or stops altogether. Also see heart misses a beat .