flinch

flinch from (someone or something)

To recoil from someone or something, often in fear. Teddy flinched from the nurse as she approached him with the needle. We all flinched from the barking dog.
See also: flinch

without flinching

Without showing any signs of fear or hesitation. I'm terrified of needles, but my sister can get blood drawn without flinching.
See also: flinch, without
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

flinch from someone or something

to move back suddenly from someone or something; to shrink (back) (from someone or something) suddenly. She struck at him and he flinched from her. At the last minute the center fielder flinched from the ball.
See also: flinch
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs.
See also:
  • flinch from
  • flinch from (someone or something)
  • bark at
  • bark at (someone or something)
  • bark out at
  • bark (something) out at (someone)
  • bark (something) to (someone)
  • bark (something) out (to someone)
  • lance through
  • shrink from
References in periodicals archive
However, the girls were surprised when Corden did not flinch, and even smiled at them.
If you do indeed have a flinch when you drop the hammer on an empty chamber, you'll find out.
In Fannie Never Flinched, Mary Cronk Farrell charts her heroine's transformation from sweatshop worker to union president and martyred protester.
Fixing a blinking habit is just like fixing a flinch. Both are subconscious habits.
Electrodes underneath the eye picked up people's flinches, a gauge of fear responses.
And if you spent a week or so convincing yourself of the possibility that Flinch might--just might--talk himself into endorsing Pride The Mountain.
The Government will not flinch from the "hard choices on public spending" needed to bring Britain's national deficit back down after the country emerges from recession.
To my surprise, they did not flinch. The youngest, in a carriage, wasn't interested.
The ultrasonic tones it emitted, undetectable to the human ear, often caused dogs to flinch and howl.
He says there are two questions that tend to make managers flinch when he is asked to consult with an organization on employee motivation and customer satisfaction.
We ought to flinch. And realistic violence should wreak havoc in the lives of those it touches.
But don't flinch at the price, because in this exalted range you can expect to get what you pay for.
On Tuesday, September 21, the Federal Open Market Committee raised short-term interest rates yet again from 1.5% to 1.75%, an increase that hasn't made the real estate market even flinch.
No wonder Tiger doesn't usually flinch over tricky left-to-right downhill putts - the poor lad is used to being being stoned in the face by Chad Campbell.
If you are already committed to a rifle and cartridge that is causing a flinch, switching to one of today's new recoil pads will certainly help.