The way your body functions inside can be really gross. Every organ, internal and external work together like a well-oiled machine but you’d faint if you saw them in action.
What you are is a vast ecosystem of complicated organs and processes designed to work for many, many decades.
Keep reading for these fascinating facts that are sure to make you squirm in your seat. Hey, it’s yours.
The Brain Is Squishy And Soft Like Butter
Many think that a brain feels like a handful of wet clay, or even a bunch of wet gummy bears stuck together.
Not even close.
The brain is a squishy mass of matter way more tender than “most of the meat you would see in a market.”
In your head is a big glob of warm butter, so be careful but do use it well.
Fingernails Are Always Growing
We don’t really give much thought to our fingernails since we’re used to their behavior.
They come and go, and always growing. Literally.
Those little clear bones are always squeezing out of your body.
Fingernails grow around one-tenth of an inch a month.
Your Guts Are Full Of Bacteria
Your intestines are full of microbial bacteria. They’ve been growing about two years after you were born.
The bacteria, or gut flora, ferments dietary fiber into short-chain fatty acids.
They provide energy for your colonic cells and other parts of your body.
Here’s a fun fact. If you could somehow zap all of the intestinal bacteria out of your body, it would be like losing an internal organ.
Your body would stop metabolizing vitamins B and K.
Remember to thank your gut flora after that delicious dinner.
You’re Covered In Dead Skin
That giant organ covering all the bones and stuff in you actually sheds.
Almost snake-like, but not as gross and graphic.
Your skin, whenever you see it, is already dead or dying and falling away from you.
The body shed 8.8 pounds of skin every year.
Your Blood Settles After You Pass
Blood pumps out of the heart and flows through us, but what happens when we pass on?
When hearts stop beating and lungs take their last breaths, the blood begins hypostasis, or suggillation.
Blood settles in the lower portion of the body.
That’s what causes a purplish red discoloration of the skin.
Your Bones Are Always Growing
Bone growth mostly stops after puberty, but bones are constantly recycling themselves to remain nice and sturdy for your daily routine.
Dr. Peter Selby is an osteoporosis expert based at Manchester Royal Infirmary. He says that your bones should be around 10 years old, depending on where they are in their bone cycle.
Old bone is broken down by cells called osteoclasts. They are replaced by bone-building cells known as osteoblasts.
When you hit middle age, bones begin to thin out and that’s when osteoporosis kicks in.
Your Mouth Constantly Makes Spit
How much spit does your mouth produce each day?
If you guessed two to four pints then you’re right.
Saliva, gross as it sounds, takes care of a bunch of annoying mouth tasks. It works to help us swallow food, break down enzymes, and fight off infections.
Rheum Collects Over Your Eyeballs
The body does gross things during sleep that it’s impossible to list them all.
When you’re awake and blinking, discharge and oily liquid cleans your eyes and those tears wash them away.
While you’re asleep, it captures mucus, oil, skin cells, and other detritus, forming them into a substance called rheum.
All of the junk in your body is there when you open your eyes.
Kidneys Turn Everything You Drink Into Urine
What you drink is simply pre-urine. Sugary drink passes into your kidneys and whatever’s left is further filtered out to be sent to your bladder for a bathroom break.
We think of the kidneys as a filter, but that’s wrong.
Those are millions of little filters, taking up all the liquid and flushing it out through smaller tubules.
Kidneys are probably the hardest working, and perhaps the grossest organs in your body.
Your Body Is Always Making Waste
What happens is your large intestine strains all the healthy bits out of the food.
Then it squishes the rest out of your colon and into your rectum. That’s where the waste hardens and waits until you find a toilet.
That, plus the fact that your kidneys are working overtime to cleanse you of all the liquid garbage you ingest.
So thank the people who build restrooms.
Little Bugs Probably Crawl All Over You
Your body may have tiny mites eating all the detritus off your skin.
These almost invisible creepy crawlies want to eat the oil and all the other fun goop on your face.
Mites usually work nights. They feast, and then they breed. Little mite families will munch on the rheum around your eyes.
If you have too many mites, there will be inflammation around the eyes, but the mites expire after a few weeks.
Mucus Lubricates You Inside And Out
Gross but mucus is the first line of defense against sickness.
The oozing yellow-greenish stuff tries to keep the walls of your mucus membranes moist. If they weren’t, cells would dry out and crack, letting harmful substances enter your body.
William Schaffner, M.D. is a professor of medicine and infectious diseases at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine.
He wants us to think of mucus as “a liquid blanket that covers the sensitive mucus membranes.”
Ear Wax Staves Off Bacteria All Day
People think earwax needs to be cleaned out all the time, but earwax fights off a wide range of bacteria, including Haemophilus influenzae, Staphylococcus aureus, and many variants of Escherichia coli.
When fungi tries to grow inside your ears, the wax fights back and keeps your canals open.
Please SHARE this with your friends and family.
