«Frazzle—colloquial term meaning to wear or ravel away; fray. Also a frayed end. One who looks frazzled is shabby or untidy.”
Many words that started as technical terms for describing yarns, threads, or fabrics, end up working their way into our vocabulary as metaphors of various kinds. I have heard or read of people saying they were frazzled, and they did not mean they were untidy, but that they felt like they were coming apart emotionally. So the meaning has changed since Mary Brooks Picken wrote this definition in The Language of Fashion in 1939.
So the word started with fabric, was applied to general appearance and has worked its way into describing one’s emotional state. The one element that survived is the reference to something or someone who is not doing all that well. If you have ever made a garment, loved wearing it, only to have the fabric itself finally give out on you, you know the feeling.














