sap

The liquid that moves through a plant and carries the food and minerals it needs.

• Sap dripped from the tree.
• They collect maple sap to make syrup.
• In spring, sap rises through the trunk.

Common phrases: tree sap, maple sap, sap flow, plant sap

Someone who is easily fooled or persuaded to do things for other people.

• Some poor sap paid for everything.
• He felt like a sap after believing her story.
• Those saps thought the fake tickets were real.

Similar words: fool, sucker, simpleton

Common phrases: a poor sap, some poor sap, a gullible sap

To gradually take away someone’s energy, strength, or confidence.

• The heat saps my energy.
• Months of criticism sapped her confidence.
• The illness had sapped him of his strength.

How to use it: sap someone of something (The long illness sapped him of strength.)

Similar words: drain, weaken, deplete

Opposites: strengthen

Common phrases: sap someone’s strength, sap someone’s energy, sap someone’s confidence