catastrophize

catastrophize (third-person singular simple present catastrophizes, present participle catastrophizing, simple past and past participle catastrophized)

1. To regard a bad situation as if it were disastrous or catastrophic.
2. (obsolete) To end a comedy.

• 1623 Henry Cockeram, Chauncey Brewster Tinker - The English Dictionarie of 1623

  ‘To end a Comedy or the like’ (Quoted in OED)

• 1947 Tavistock Institute of Human Relations, University of Michigan Research Center for Group Dynamics - Human Relations

  Particularly likely to overreact are those who tend to catastrophize (Ellis, 1962) and those who have Type A personalities (Friedman & Rosenman, 1974)

• 2001 David H. Barlow - Clinical Handbook of Psychological Disorders

  Another way to catastrophize is to jump to an extreme conclusion from an unimportant or irrelevant event.

• OED 2nd edition 1989 + 2004 (online)