Definition of "choking" []

• Causing a feeling of being choked or suffocated: The hall was filled with choking clouds of smoke. (adjective)
• Having a strained or husky sound: spoke in a choking voice. (adjective)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "One attendant, on the very day he had been discharged for choking a patient into an insensibility so profound that it had been necessary to call a physician to restore him, said to me, "They are getting pretty damned strict these days, discharging a man simply for _choking_ a patient.""
• "The phrase choking under pressure has been used to describe what happens when people perform at a lower level than what they are capable of in high-stakes situations."
• "Eating quickly, attempting to swallow a large amount of food or swallowing fibrous and/or poorly chewed food (meat is the most frequent culprit) often results in choking in humans."