How to Use unhappily in a Sentence

unhappily

adverb
  • They were unhappily married for two years.
  • That to me seems a heck of a lot better than living unhappily and in a state of limbo.
    Jackie Pilossoph, chicagotribune.com, 26 Apr. 2017
  • As the train pulled out of the station, screeching wheels drowned out the sound of a cat meowing unhappily.
    Los Angeles Times, 6 May 2022
  • The tutor laughed at the pair of them, sitting there at the table so unhappily, just because of maths.
    Tessa Hadley, The New Yorker, 17 July 2023
  • Both Rothman and Rosen were unhappily married in the time between the war and their meeting in 1990.
    Sarah Schreiber, Good Housekeeping, 11 Nov. 2016
  • Brown spent nine years with the Steelers, being named to the Pro Bowl in seven of them, but his time there ended unhappily.
    Ben Shpigel, New York Times, 10 Sep. 2019
  • One of the many ironies here is that on the eve of the election the two sides were moving, not unhappily, toward an optimistic détente.
    Gregory Krieg, CNN, 1 June 2017
  • The unhappily married women who traveled to Sioux Falls did so in style.
    Jennifer Wilson, The New Republic, 28 June 2022
  • Now, an unhappily married Jesse has written a novel about that night and is in Paris for the last stop of his European book tour.
    Brian Smolensky, EW.com, 13 Dec. 2022
  • Jay and Linda heard about a donkey housed unhappily an hour north, whose spouse likewise had died.
    Jane Shore, The New Yorker, 31 Aug. 2020
  • As long as a person is unhappily single, there must be something wrong.
    Morgan Parker, ELLE, 4 June 2022
  • Samir sits unhappily, wearing a suit the F.B.I. gave him, pretending to be rich and powerful.
    Julian Joslin, The New Yorker, 18 Nov. 2021
  • This is, unhappily, a lesson that needs to be relearned anew each generation, like the ravages of inflation, the risks of public debt, and the true price of war.
    Kevin D. Williamson, National Review, 18 Feb. 2022
  • The last one came in the mid-1990s under Fed Chair Alan Greenspan, an episode that ended unhappily for many developing countries.
    Paul Wiseman, The Christian Science Monitor, 5 May 2022
  • One breakthrough that’s been welcomed by the unhappily hirsute is laser hair removal.
    Fiorella Valdesolo, WSJ, 31 Aug. 2017
  • Looking unhappily at him, Yura took a half-empty pack of Astra cigarettes and a box of matches out of his pants pocket.
    Vladimir Sorokin, The New Yorker, 27 Sep. 2021
  • Her unhappily married parents divorced when Diana was 7, and she was sent to boarding school two years later.
    San Diego Union-Tribune, 13 Aug. 2021
  • According to legend, this dish was dreamed up by an unhappily married woman named Ezo who was trying to win over her mother-in-law via her stomach.
    Lisa Morrow, CNN, 25 Mar. 2022
  • Cruz stars as Clara, an unhappily married mother of three coping with mental health issues.
    Scott Roxborough, The Hollywood Reporter, 1 Nov. 2022
  • Set on the island of Brittany in the late 18th century, the French film brings together a young woman who’s unhappily betrothed and the female painter who’s been (secretly) hired to paint her portrait.
    Sage Young, refinery29.com, 28 Feb. 2020
  • The idea was that a gentleman could fly down to the Caribbean, unhappily married, and return home a few days later blissfully single.
    Robert Goulder, Forbes, 18 June 2021
  • After imbibing too much at a party, an unhappily single woman falls into bed with the fiance of her best friend.
    Los Angeles Times, 4 Oct. 2019
  • Affleck and de Armas play the unhappily married Van Allens.
    Darren Franich, EW.com, 16 Mar. 2022
  • Autumn works in a supermarket with her cousin and is unhappily pregnant.
    Josephine Livingstone, The New Republic, 8 Apr. 2020
  • The story follows Bridget Everett’s Sam, who has unhappily returned to her tiny hometown in Kansas to nurse her dying sister.
    Los Angeles Times Staff, Los Angeles Times, 28 Apr. 2023
  • Yet when so many human beings embrace the destiny of becoming parents, whether happily or unhappily, what right does any one person have to refuse it?
    Adam Kirsch, The Atlantic, 13 May 2018
  • The number also assumes that most charging stations will be in good working order, something that EV drivers unhappily have not found.
    IEEE Spectrum, 23 Dec. 2022
  • When this season began, Claire was unhappily married in Boston with dreary Frank.
    Roxane Gay, Glamour, 10 Dec. 2017
  • Janka, as she was known, was unhappily married to another man, a film director.
    Adam Kirsch, The New Yorker, 29 May 2017
  • In her second photo, Simpson shows off her adorable dog Dixie, who’s (much more unhappily) receiving a shower.
    Henry Chandonnet, Peoplemag, 17 July 2023

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'unhappily.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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