embarrassment

embarrassment
    n 1: the shame you feel when your inadequacy or guilt is made
         public
    2: the state of being embarrassed (usually by some financial
       inadequacy); "he is currently suffering financial
       embarrassments"
    3: some event that causes someone to be embarrassed; "the
       outcome of the vote was an embarrassment for the liberals"
       [ant: {disembarrassment}]
    4: extreme excess; "an embarrassment of riches" [syn:
       {overplus}, {plethora}, {superfluity}, {embarrassment}]
    

Embarrassment \Em*bar"rass*ment\, n. [F. embarrassement.]
   1. A state of being embarrassed; perplexity; impediment to
      freedom of action; entanglement; hindrance; confusion or
      discomposure of mind, as from not knowing what to do or to
      say; disconcertedness.
      [1913 Webster]

            The embarrassment which inexperienced minds have
            often to express themselves upon paper. --W. Irving.
      [1913 Webster]

            The embarrassments tom commerce growing out of the
            late regulations.                     --Bancroft.
      [1913 Webster]

   2. Difficulty or perplexity arising from the want of money to
      pay debts.
      [1913 Webster]
    

201 Moby Thesaurus words for "embarrassment":
      abasement, abashment, absorption, agitation, awkwardness, baffle,
      bafflement, bashfulness, befuddlement, bewilderment, bind, bother,
      botheration, broken fortune, burden, burthen, cargo, chagrin,
      chaos, charge, cloud, clumsiness, clutch, comedown, complication,
      confoundment, confusion, constraint, coyness, cross, crunch,
      cumbrance, daze, deadweight, debasement, deflation, demureness,
      demurity, descent, difficulties, difficulty, dilemma, disadvantage,
      discombobulation, discomfiture, discomfort, discomposure,
      disconcert, disconcertedness, disconcertion, disconcertment,
      discountenance, disgrace, disorder, disorganization,
      disorientation, distress, disturbance, dump, embarrassing position,
      encumbrance, engagement, enigma, enmeshment, entanglement, excess,
      fine how-do-you-do, fix, flummox, flurry, fluster, flutter, fog,
      freight, frenzy, fuddle, fuddlement, genteel poverty, hamper,
      handicap, hangdog look, hard pinch, hardship, haze, hell to pay,
      hobble, hot water, how-do-you-do, humbled pride, humiliation,
      imbroglio, impecuniosity, impecuniousness, impediment, impedimenta,
      implication, imposition, inclusion, inconvenience, insolvency,
      involution, involvement, jam, jumble, letdown, light purse, load,
      lumber, maze, mess, mist, mix, morass, mortification, mousiness,
      muddle, muddlement, mystery, narrow means, nonplus, onus,
      oversupply, pack, parlous straits, pass, penalty, perplexity,
      perturbation, pickle, pinch, plight, poorness, pother, poverty,
      predicament, pretty pass, pretty pickle, pretty predicament,
      problem, profusion, pucker, put-down, puzzle, puzzlement, quagmire,
      quandary, quicksand, relation, riddle, ruffle, scrape,
      self-abasement, self-abnegation, self-consciousness,
      self-diminishment, setdown, shame, shamefacedness, shamefastness,
      shuffle, shyness, skittishness, slender means, slough, spot,
      squeeze, stagefright, stammering, stew, sticky wicket, strain,
      strait, straitened circumstances, straits, superabundance,
      superfluity, surplus, swamp, sweat, swivet, tight spot,
      tight squeeze, tightrope, timidity, timidness, timorousness, tizzy,
      tricky spot, trouble, unassuredness, unease, uneasiness,
      unholy mess, unprosperousness, unsettlement, upset, vexation,
      voluntary poverty, vows of poverty, weight, white elephant