Body Parts & Health
Body Parts & Health
You already met me duele (it hurts me) in the gustar lesson — this is where that pattern earns its keep, describing pain and health across the whole body.
Grammar Comparison
Grammar Comparison
Doler works exactly like gustar
me duele la cabeza (my head hurts) — literally 'the head is-hurting to-me'
my head hurts — 'head' is the subject, matching English's own structure here
Doler (to hurt) follows the same backward sentence shape as gustar: the body part is the grammatical subject, and the person feeling the pain becomes an indirect object pronoun. Interestingly, English's 'my head hurts' actually agrees with Spanish's structure here, unlike gustar — this is one doler pattern that won't feel backward once you say it out loud.
Body parts use the definite article, not a possessive
me duele la cabeza (not 'me duele mi cabeza') — la, not mi
my head hurts — 'my' is required
Because the reflexive/indirect pronoun (me) already makes clear whose body part is being discussed, Spanish uses the plain definite article la/el instead of a possessive like mi — adding mi as well would be redundant, not just optional. This shows up constantly with body parts and clothing, so get used to dropping the possessive here even when English insists on keeping it.
Vocabulary
Vocabulary
- English
- the head
- English
- the stomach
- English
- the throat
- English
- my head hurts
- English
- my feet hurt
- English
- I'm sick
- English
- I have a fever
- English
- the hand
- English
- the arm
- English
- the doctor