heavy going

1. Difficult, as in Tom found calculus heavy going , or It's going to be heavy weather for us from here on . The first expression originally referred to a road or path that was hard to negotiate; the variant alludes to bad weather at sea. [Mid-1800s]

2. make heavy weather of . Make hard work or a fuss over something, especially unnecessarily. For example, They made heavy weather of the differences between their proposals, which actually seemed much alike . This use of weather likens a commotion to a storm. [Mid-1900s]

Idioms and Phrases

Also, heavy weather .

Example Sentences

The snow on the upper glacier was soft and made very heavy going.

From Project Gutenberg

Lionel walked a little in front of Winn; the snow was soft and made heavy going.

From Project Gutenberg

The walk to Pontresina is the coldest and darkest of winter walks, and the snow made it heavy going.

From Project Gutenberg

The snow was deep and the sledge teams had heavy going at first.

From Project Gutenberg

The water was pouring down the hill sides, every deep deer track was a torrent, and it was heavy going through the marshes.

From Project Gutenberg