doing time
Behind bars now
Doing time is serving a prison sentence.
The phrase treats incarceration as time that must be endured or worked through: He did time for armed robbery.
It can extend to any period of obligatory waiting or suffering: I did my time in that dead-end job.
- prisonConfinement for offenders
- big houseInformal term for prison
- up the riverSlang for imprisoned
- jailDetention facility
- solitary confinementIsolated imprisonment in cell
incarceration · convict · on the inside · detention · penitentiary · cell block · parole · inmate · maximum security · stretch · reintegration · warden · sentence · commissary · cell · prison yard · vocational training · good behavior
- prison sentenceslife sentence, prison term, sentence length, life without parole, mandatory minimum
- prisoncell block, inmate, jail, prison, prisoner
- Euphemismspass away, passed away, passed on, expecting, with child
- Prison Memoirsprison memoirs, prison letters, behind bars, prison life, escape stories
- prison slangshank, shiv, yard, cellie, commissary
- sentencinglife sentence, life sentences, prison sentence, death row, consecutive sentences
doing timefree
Without payment or restriction
at liberty · on the outside · released · out · paroled
doing timeacquitted
Declared legally innocent
exonerated · found not guilty · cleared · vindicated · let off
doing timeliving large
Indulging in excess
living it up · free as a bird · at large · footloose and fancy-free · at leisure
time, done, doing, undone, times, timeless, timer, does, timely