Down in the dumps Informal

Feeling sad, depressed, or low in spirits, often without one specific dramatic cause.

It describes a mood rather than a crisis — a general gloominess or flatness that can settle in for anything from a bad day to a longer stretch of low motivation.

The key word “dump” (in this now-obsolete plural sense) is recorded in English from the 1520s meaning a fit of brooding or musing, and the standard theory traces it back to the Dutch word “domp,” meaning haze or mist, itself descended from Middle Dutch “damp” (vapor) — the same root that gives German its “dumpf,” meaning dull or muffled. The figurative logic lines up neatly: just as a physical haze obscures clear vision, a mental “dump” was pictured as a fog clouding clear thinking or good spirits. By the mid-16th century “in the dumps” had already settled into its now-familiar sense of low mood, meaning the phrase has kept essentially the same meaning, almost unchanged, for roughly five hundred years.

He’s been down in the dumps ever since he lost the game.

I don’t know why, but I’ve felt down in the dumps all week.

She tried to cheer up her friend, who seemed really down in the dumps.

A: “You look down in the dumps today.” B: “Yeah, just one of those days.”