Health, the Body, and at the Doctor | Czech Grammar

Talking about how you feel is where Czech most stubbornly refuses to translate word-for-word from English. English makes you the grammatical subject — "I feel sick," "my head hurts" — but Czech keeps the person off the throne. In Je mi špatně you are in the dative ("it is badly to me"), and in Bolí mě hlava the head is the subject and you are an accusative object. Get these two frames straight and the whole topic — feeling unwell, naming the part that aches, reporting symptoms at the doctor's — becomes predictable instead of a string of memorised oddities.

Feeling unwell: the dative experiencer Je mi…

To say you feel good or bad, Czech uses an impersonal construction: a dummy "it" (never spoken), the verb být ("to be"), an adverb describing the state, and you in the dative.

Je + dative + adverb — literally "it-is to-someone somehow"

Není mi dobře, asi půjdu domů.

I don't feel well, I'll probably go home.

Je mi špatně, snědla jsem něco zkaženého.

I feel sick, I ate something off. (female speaker)

Už je mi mnohem líp, děkuju.

I already feel much better, thanks. (líp = colloquial 'better')

The dative pronoun (mi, ti, mu, jí, nám, vám, jim) names who is feeling it, and the adverb — not an adjective — names the feeling: dobře (well), špatně / zle (bad/ill), líp / lépe (better), hůř (worse). The same frame covers temperature and other bodily states:

Czech	Literal	Meaning
Je mi špatně.	it-is to-me badly	I feel sick.
Je mi zle.	it-is to-me ill	I feel unwell / queasy.
Není mi dobře.	it-isn't to-me well	I don't feel well.
Je mi horko / zima.	it-is to-me hot / cold	I'm hot / cold.
Je mi líp.	it-is to-me better	I feel better.

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There is no "I" subject here. The state is an adverb and you are in the dative: Je mi špatně = "it is badly to-me." Saying Jsem špatně ("I am badly") is the single most common English-speaker error in the whole topic.

This dative-of-experiencer is a major Czech pattern, not a one-off; it powers dozens of být expressions and is laid out fully on the dative experiencer, the dative of experiencer in verb government, and být expressions with the dative.

The part that aches: Bolí mě + body part

For a specific ache, Czech uses the verb bolet ("to hurt"), and here the grammar flips in a way English speakers consistently misread. The body part is the subject (nominative), and the person is the object in the accusative:

body part (nominative subject) + bolí + person (accusative object)

So Bolí mě hlava is literally "head hurts me" — hlava ("head") is the subject doing the hurting, and mě ("me," accusative) is the one hurt. This is why the verb agrees with the body part, not with you:

Bolí mě hlava a je mi nějak slabo.

My head hurts and I feel sort of faint.

Od rána mě bolí v krku.

My throat's been hurting since this morning. (idiom: 'it hurts me in the throat')

Bolí mě nohy, celý den jsem stála.

My legs hurt, I've been standing all day. (female speaker)

Two things to lock in. First, the experiencer pronoun is accusative (mě, tě, ho, ji, nás, vás, je) — contrast it carefully with the dative mi of Je mi špatně; mě and mi are different words. Second, when the aching part is plural, the verb becomes plural too: Bolí mě hlava (singular) but Bolí mě nohy / Bolí mě oči (plural subject). The throat takes the fixed locative idiom bolí mě v krku.

Construction	Person is in the…	Verb agrees with…
Je mi špatně.	dative (mi)	nobody (impersonal "it")
Bolí mě hlava.	accusative (mě)	the body part (hlava)

Body vocabulary — with genders and the famous dual plurals

To slot a body part into Bolí mě…, you need its gender (for the agreement) and, for the paired organs, its irregular plural. Czech preserves an ancient dual number only in body parts that come in pairs — ruce, nohy, oči, uši — and these plurals are not formed regularly:

Singular	Gender	Plural	Meaning
hlava	fem.	hlavy	head
oko	neut.	oči (fem. pl.!)	eye(s)
ucho	neut.	uši (fem. pl.!)	ear(s)
ruka	fem.	ruce	hand(s) / arm(s)
noha	fem.	nohy	leg(s) / foot (feet)
zub	masc.	zuby	tooth
krk	masc.	krky	neck / throat
břicho	neut.	břicha	belly / stomach
záda	neut. (plural only)	záda	back

The startling cases are oko → oči and ucho → uši: a neuter singular whose plural behaves like a feminine. These duals even keep a special instrumental in -ma — očima, ušima, rukama, nohama — a relic you'll hear in fixed phrases like vlastníma očima ("with my own eyes"). The full set is on dual remnants and the body-part inventory on body-part duals.

Bolí mě oči, celý den koukám do počítače.

My eyes hurt, I've been staring at the computer all day.

Bolí mě v zádech a špatně se mi dýchá.

My back hurts and I'm having trouble breathing.

At the doctor's: symptoms with mít and feelings with cítit se

Concrete symptoms are usually "had" — the verb mít with the ailment in the accusative:

Czech	English
Mám rýmu.	I have a runny nose / a cold.
Mám kašel.	I have a cough.
Mám horečku / teplotu.	I have a fever / a temperature.
Mám chřipku.	I have the flu.
Potřebuji recept.	I need a prescription.

Mám rýmu, kašel a teplotu — asi mám chřipku.

I have a runny nose, a cough and a temperature — I think I've got the flu.

Pane doktore, potřebuju recept na antibiotika.

Doctor, I need a prescription for antibiotics.

Alongside the dative Je mi špatně, there is a second, more English-like way to say how you feel: cítit se ("to feel") + an adverb. Here you are the subject, which makes it the friendlier option for beginners — but note it's still followed by an adverb, not an adjective:

Cítím se mnohem líp než včera.

I feel much better than yesterday.

Necítím se dobře, půjdu k doktorovi.

I don't feel well, I'll go to the doctor.

Both Je mi špatně and Cítím se špatně mean "I feel bad" and both are everyday; the first keeps you in the dative, the second puts you back in the nominative subject seat. Knowing both lets you understand whichever a Czech reaches for.

Common Mistakes

❌ Jsem špatně.

Incorrect — feeling unwell is impersonal with a dative experiencer: Je mi špatně, not 'I am badly'.

✅ Je mi špatně.

I feel sick.

❌ Bolím hlavu.

Incorrect — you don't 'hurt the head'; the head hurts you. The part is the subject, you are accusative.

✅ Bolí mě hlava.

My head hurts.

❌ Bolí mi hlava.

Incorrect — bolet takes the accusative experiencer mě, not the dative mi.

✅ Bolí mě hlava.

My head hurts.

❌ Bolí mě oka.

Incorrect — 'eyes' has the dual-remnant plural oči, not a regular neuter plural.

✅ Bolí mě oči.

My eyes hurt.

❌ Cítím se špatný.

Incorrect — cítit se is followed by an adverb (špatně), not the adjective špatný.

✅ Cítím se špatně.

I feel bad.

Key Takeaways

Feeling unwell is impersonal + dative: Je mi špatně / Není mi dobře — there is no "I" subject, and the state word is an adverb.
Bolet flips the roles: the body part is the nominative subject, you are the accusative object — Bolí mě hlava ("head hurts me"), with the verb agreeing with the part.
Watch the pronoun: dative mi in Je mi špatně versus accusative mě in Bolí mě.
Paired organs keep the ancient dual: oko → oči, ucho → uši (neuter going feminine!), ruka → ruce, noha → nohy, with the relic instrumental -ma.
Symptoms are "had": mít
- accusative (mám rýmu, mám horečku); and cítit se
  - adverb is the subject-keeping alternative to Je mi….

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