Hello and welcome to another edition of Ethan’s English cafe.com’s Fantastic Phrases, today we will stay with the body, but instead move around to the back of it. We will be looking at four idioms involve your back. The idioms we will look at are to have your back to the wall, to get off someone’s back, to stab in the back and to turn your back on someone.

To have your back to the wall means that you are in a very difficult position and have no room or opportunity to negotiate or do anything else. Originally this was a military term meaning the army had retreated so far back there was no more room to retreat so they had to fight or surrender, their backs were to the wall. Nowadays you can use it in many situations like if your business is losing money and you have no options but to fire people or close you can say “I’m sorry I have to let you all go, but my back is to the wall on this.”

If someone does something because their back was to the wall, you should probably get off their back about it. To get off someone’s back means to stop harrassing and bothering them about something. If your mom wants you to clean your room and is always saying “Go clean your room!” you might get tired of her saying it and want to tell her “Hey! Get off my back about it, I’ll clean it as soon as I can!” but you probably shouldn’t say it to your mom as it’s not very polite and she might smack you.

Once everyone gets off your back I hope no one stabs you in the back while you aren’t paying attention. To stab someone in the back is used when someone you thought was your friend does something to hurt you, it can be physical or verbal. If your good friend knows you like a girl at school and one day your friend tells that girl you are a bad person and she shouldn’t date you, that person has stabbed you in the back.

If someone does stab you in the back one day, I suggest you immediately turn your back on them. To turn your back on someone means to stop helping or being friends with them. I’ve found that some people, when they get a girlfriend or boyfriend, will stop spending time with their other friends, if your friend does this one day you can ask them “Why did you turn your back on me as soon as you got your girlfriend?”

So when your back is to the wall and you are very stressed, tell everyone to get off your back about the little complaints. and if anyone does stab you in the back be sure to turn your back on them and stop talking to them because stabbing your friends in the back is the worst thing you can do.

So there we go, four English Idioms all about the back, If you have any questions or comments about them please put them in the comments below or in the forum! For everyone here at Ethan’s English Cafe.com, thanks for watching, I hope you found it informative and useful and I’ll see you again next time!