- ORDEAL
- Painful experience
- Fraternity initiation ritual, e.g.
- Rough go
- Drawn-out battle
- Difficult time
- Hell on Earth
- Trier of men's souls
- Trial
- Trying experience
- Tough grind
- No picnic
- Baptism of fire
- Tough sledding
- Grueling experience
- Tough period
- Bad piano recital, for one
- Big test
- Medieval method of trial
- Tough test
- Trying period
- Major hassle
- Time of tribulation
- Tough time
- Severe test
- Grueling test
- Severe trial
- It's no picnic
- Tough row to hoe
- 2020, for many
- Odysseus' journey, for example
- Tough go
- Trying time
- Difficult experience
- It's trying
- Tough road to hoe
- Hardly a walk in the park
- Tough going
- Difficult test or agreement (6)
- Difficult trial
- Ancient method of trial.
- How witches were tried.
- Novel by Nevil Shute.
- Putting on a benefit, for instance.
- Ancient form of trial.
- Old trial device.
- Feverel's burden
- Harrowing experience
- Meredith's "The ___ of Richard Feverel"
- The worst kind of test
- Gantlet
- Feverel's trial
- Terrible experience
- Boot camp, typically
- Trial by fire
- Terrible trial
- Test of one's mettle
- No walk in the park
- Baptism by fire
- Experience you might want to forget
- Extended trial
- Kidnapping, e.g.
- Traveling around the holidays, maybe
- Climbing Mount Everest, e.g.
- Hell week, e.g.
- Tough slog
- Herculean undertaking
- Flying a commercial airline, often
- Opposite of a breeze
- Nightmare
- Tough trial
- Frat initiation, maybe
- Horrible experience
- Difficult challenge
- Tribulation
- Moving long-distance, e.g.
- Stressful experience
- The gauntlet
- Baptism by fire, for example
- Severe experience
- Boot camp, to many
- Nightmare of a situation
- Bad experience
- Difficult test
- Boot camp, as a rule
- Trying test
- Nightmarish experience
- Agonizing experience
