kill (one) with kindness

To harm, inconvenience, or bother one by treating them with excessive favor or kindness. The phrase originated as the expression "kill with kindness as fond apes do their young," referring to the notion that such animals sometimes crushed their offspring by hugging them too hard. I love talking to Grandma, but she calls me twice a day to see how I'm doing—right now she's killing me with kindness.

kill someone with kindness

If you kill someone with kindness, you treat them too kindly when this is not what they need or want. `He is killing me with kindness,' Sallie says. `He's just too attentive.'

kill someone with (or by) kindness

spoil someone by overindulging them.

This expression dates back to the mid 16th century; it famously appears in the title of Thomas Heywood's play A Woman Killed with Kindness ( 1607 ).