Liver Education with Morgan da Organ

Morgan here with my second lesson.  It's all about digestion and how essential I am to this process  As I said before, I am your inspection station.  If I'm not healthy or being over worked, I can't perform my job properly.  I've included an illustration of the human digestive system.  That's me up top-the darker purple organ.  Your stomach is to my left and below me.  Your esophagus is the little tube connected to your stomach.  The small, lighter colored organ is your gallbladder-it sort of looks like a pea attached to me. Right under your stomach is your pancreas-it looks like it's being strangled by your small intestine.

 

PART TWO – THE THREE MAIN FUNCTIONS OF YOUR LIVER

1.        It digests stuff

2.        It produces proteins

3.        It gets rid of stuff

Digestion Process

First of all, digestion is the process of breaking down foods and beverages into tiny particles your body can use for energy and to build and nourish your cells.  There are 6 primary processes of your digestive system.

1.        Ingestion of food/beverage

2.        Secretion of fluids and digestive enzymes

3.        Mixing and movement of food and wastes through the body

4.        Digestion of food into smaller pieces

5.        Absorption of nutrients

6.        Excretion of wastes

The Liver’s Job

The digestive process happens in the mouth, esophagus, stomach, intestines then the liver, gallbladder and pancreas.  The main function of the liver in the digestive process is the production of bile and it’s secretion into the small intestine.   The liver is where everything gets inspected and classified as either helpful or harmful.  The nutrients are then transformed into a different biochemical form either targeted for absorption or waste.

Liver cells convert cholesterol into bile acids.  These then mix with more cholesterol, other lipids, electrolytes, water and the waste produced from the breakdown of old red blood cells (bilirubin).  The liver secretes the bile through the bile ducts to your gallbladder.  The gallbladder is sort of a holding tank keeping the excess bile until the partially digested food from your next meals enters your small intestine.

Bile acids are unique because they can mix with fats and mix with water‐this makes them a lipid.  As the bile enters the small intestine, it mixes with the fat particles in the partially digested food.  It breaks apart the large fat globules into tiny fat droplets that float in the watery intestine contents. The way bile acts on fat is very similar to how detergent breaks apart grease.  Enzymes produced in the pancreas and small intestines can then digest the tiny fat droplets into fatty acids your body can use.  So, once the food has been reduced to its building blocks and the good stuff has been separated from the harmful stuff, it is ready for the body to absorb.

What Does That All Mean to Morgan?

If you go out and celebrate or, just stay home and drink all night, I will be working continuous overtime trying to get rid of all that alcohol.  I’m the only organ in charge of processing alcohol and detoxifying the blood.  Breaking down your alcohol is only one of more than 500 vital functions I perform.  I don’t really have a lot of time to do this.  This means that I can only handle so much alcohol at once – I’M BUSY!!!!  If you overload me, the excess alcohol will end up circulating in your bloodstream affecting your brain, heart and other tissue.  The consequences of this is the destruction of my cells, build-up of fat deposits which clogs the flow of blood (remember I’m mostly airy space).  This could all result in fatty liver or, even more serious, inflammation (alcoholic hepatitis) and permanent scarring (cirrhosis) and God forbid, liver cancer!  All I’m trying to say here is to drink responsibly and love your liver (me).