death's door, at/near

Extremely ill or very close to death or total destruction. A case of untreated rabies left me suddenly at death's door. There are many parts of the environment that are now at death's door due to the effects of pollution.

very near the end of one's life. (Often an exaggeration.) I was so ill that I was at death's door for three days. The family dog was at death's door for three days, and then it finally died.

On the point of dying, very ill, as in Whenever she had a bad cold she acted as though she were at death's door. The association of death with an entry way was first made in English in the late 1300s, and the phrase itself dates from the mid-1500s. Today it is often used as an exaggeration of ill health.

If someone is at death's door, they are seriously ill and are likely to die. He has won five golf competitions in three months, a year after being at death's door. Note: You can also say that someone is near death's door. The singer said he was `active and feeling very well' as he responded to reports that he was near death's door. Note: You can say that someone comes back from death's door or is brought back from death's door when they have recovered from a very serious illness. The patient has been brought back from death's door by the radical treatment, say his doctors.

Near to death; gravely ill or injured.

Moribund, dangerously ill. Presumably this metaphor originated in the idea that death was a state of being one could enter, that is, an afterlife. It was used by Miles Coverdale (an early translator of the Bible) in A Spyrytuall Pearle (1550), “To bring unto death’s door,” and was repeated by Shakespeare and eventually, in more secular context, by later writers. Eric Partridge deemed it a cliché by about 1850.