NURSE Basic Verbs Learn English Grammar

hi everybody my name is alicia welcome

back to know your verbs in this episode

we’re going to talk about the verb

nurse let’s get started

okay so let’s start with the basic

definition of the verb

nurse the basic definition of the verb

nurse is to care for

someone or something it means

to care a lot or to give

a lot of attention and care

to someone examples her family

nursed her to health he nursed his wife

during her illness

okay let’s look at the conjugations of

this verb

present nurse nurses

past nursed past participle

nursed progressive nursing

all right now let’s move on to some

additional meanings for this verb

the first additional meaning is to

provide or

take breast milk as for babies

okay let’s begin with a couple examples

the baby is nursing well how long

are you planning to nurse the baby so in

these situations

the example sentences are relating to

either a baby

drinking breast milk or to a mother

giving

breast milk to a baby in the first

example sentence the baby

is nursing well it means the baby is

eating or the baby is drinking well

and that refers to breast milk

specifically so

not anything else but nursing refers

specifically to having

mother’s milk in the second example

sentence a question

how long are you going to nurse the baby

it means how long are you going

to provide breast milk for the baby so

this is probably a question

for mothers or i suppose it could be

fathers also

asking about the baby’s care but nurse

in this way when talking about newborn

children

refers to milk either giving or taking

if you’re talking about the baby okay

let’s move on to the second

additional meaning for this verb the

second additional meaning is to use

something

carefully to avoid pain or to avoid

injury examples he’s been nursing his

hand

all day she’s nursing her left

foot isn’t she so we see nursing

used in the progressive tense in the ing

form in both of these

in the first example sentence about

nursing his hand

that means he’s using his hand very

carefully

maybe because it’s painful to use the

hand

regularly so for example if a person

breaks their wrist

which i’ve done it might be painful to

move the hand properly

so to avoid pain people might

nurse that um that wrist or might nurse

the broken bone or might nurse their

injury

meaning that they’re very careful like

they move it slowly

for example or they don’t move it very

much or they don’t apply much weight to

it

we see the same thing in the second

example sentence she’s nursing her left

foot

isn’t she that shows that perhaps she’s

not applying much weight she’s not

stepping or standing a lot on her left

foot or she’s being very careful about

her left

foot so nursing shows that they’re

taking some

extra kind of care with an injured or

painful part of the body

so this is an additional meaning of the

word nurse

the third additional meaning is to

consume

over a long period sometimes an

unusually long period

examples you’re really nursing that beer

she nursed her tea by the window all

right

so we commonly see this with drinks

actually so

um drinks if you take a very long

time to consume the drink to drink the

drink

someone might say you’re nursing your

drink it just means you’re taking an

unusually long time to drink it

if for example as in the first sentence

you’re

really nursing that beer it’s like your

friends or whoever you’re drinking with

they expect you to drink the beer more

quickly than you’re drinking it now so

maybe you’ve had the same beer

for an hour or two hours maybe but your

friends have had

two drinks for example so that means

maybe you’re taking an

unusually long time in the second

example sentence she nursed her tea

by the window it’s like she’s just

taking a long time

to enjoy her tea for example maybe she’s

holding it and not drinking it quickly

just means she’s taking her time to

consume the drink

so nurse can have this meaning of taking

a long time

to like drink or eat or consume

something but commonly used with drinks

so the verb nurse doesn’t actually have

any particular phrasal verbs or

idioms that are used along with it but i

hope that you were able to find a few

new meanings from the additional meaning

section of this video

so if you have any questions or comments

or if you would like to try to make a

sentence

using the verb nurse please feel free to

do so in the comment section of this

video

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thanks very much for watching this

episode of know your verbs and we’ll see

you again

soon bye-bye do something carefully to

avoid pain right

okay the second sorry

i will read it properly now all right