Myślałam, że mi odbija.

Can anybody explain how this sentence works? The English translation on CM is given as ‘I thought I was losing my mind’. The literal translation I think is something like ‘I thought (it) was reflecting on me’. I’ve looked up the infinitive of ‘odbija’ which gives ‘odbijać’ (imp. verb), which gives multiple different meanings:

to bounce to broach to mirror to chip off to fork to fork off to impress to make a copy of to print to injure to prise open to pry open to push off to set sail to recapture to rescue to retake to recoil to return to take out to vent to turn off to strike off to reflect to image to take away.

I’m finding it difficult to relate any of these meanings to a loss of sanity, as per the CM translation, unless it perhaps it relates to ‘to take away (sanity)’?. Can anyone explain the CM translation any further? Thanks

I like to check the PWN Słownik Języka Polskiego when I want to understand nuances that bilingual references may not touch upon. As you’ve noted, “odbić się” has a variety of literal and figurative meanings related to the general idea of “reflecting/bouncing off.”

Looking up the word in the SJP (odbić - definicja, synonimy, przykłady użycia), I think meaning 7 most closely relates to this sense: “wywrzeć na coś wpływ, zwykle niekorzystny” (to have an influence on something, usually adverse). So, I guess the idea is that whatever it is, is “bouncing off” you, it is not agreeable or making sense, and is therefore upsetting. But it’s probably not worth trying to understand the phrase too literally as I’m sure Polish natives just encounter it as a set expression.

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Thanks for your help and for the very useful link, it it appreciated. I thought it could just be an idiomatic/colloquial expression. Cheers

@calydzien is right, this is a set expression that we natives don’t think about too much. It’s hard for me to say why the verb might have ended up as part of the idiom.

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