The Dig-Buddies

The working of the digestive system

Richa Jain Jindal – 27.1.2015

Once upon a time, there was a small boy, who lived in a small town, away from the hustle bustle of big city. He was a happy boy.

Do you know, why he was happy? Because he had happy friends! Happy secret friends! These were parts of his digestive system. He called them dig-buddies.

The dig-buddies helped each other, worked together and were always active. The boy unknowingly took good care of them, by eating healthy food, i.e. eating proteins, carbohydrates, fats, vitamins and minerals in the right proportion, and being physically active.

These secret friends did the difficult job of breaking down the food he ate. The blood then absorbed nutrients from the processed food and circulated these nutrients to the whole body and thus kept the boy healthy and active.

(Related video -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JnzwbipJuAA)

As soon the boy ate something, different parts of mouth would get active. Teeth would cut and chop the food. The tongue, with the help of saliva, would roll it into a ball and push down to the oesophagus, the food pipe.

The food pipe would carry food to the stomach.

The stomach would churn the food and add digestive juices to it. These juices would clean the food-mash by killing germs and also break down food even in smaller parts.

Then the food-mash would reach small intestine.

Small instestine, with the help of its two friends – Liver and Pancreas, would break it down even further.

The liver would supply bile for digestion and pancreas, the digestive juices.

Small intestine would then let blood absorb the nutrients from the alomost liquified food and send waste to the large intestine.

Blood would carry nutirents to all the body parts.

Large intestine would sieve water out of its sides to the body. The left behind food would move to the rectum to be taken out of the body.

The dig-buddies and the other body-parts were happy, energetic and growing day by day and so was the boy.

On one fine day, the boy saw a new eating joint in his small quiet town. It was a fast food restaurant. He went inside and saw yummy, attractive items on the menu card. He ordered a burger and starting eating it. The tongue said ‘ Ummmmm!’

‘Yummmmmyyyy!’ thought the boy.

As soon as the food got into his mouth, the body-buddies got active and performed their respective tasks diligently, as usual. The food contained some amount of protein and an excess of carbohydrates and fat. The body received some protein and a lot of carbohydrates and fats. The boy liked the taste of this newly found food, so he stared eating it regularly.

There was now an excess supply of carbohydrates and fats. The dig-buddies had to work really hard to break down fat and carbs. These are the most stubborn members of the nutrient-family and difficult to digest.

Now, as there was an excess supply of carbohydrates and fat, so the question came up, where to store them? The body started storing it underneath the skin, as there was no other place to store them.

The liver was tired of making and sending bile to small instestine as the digestive juices only from pancreas were not enough to breakdown tough food into smaller pieces.

The continuous more than needed supply of fats and carbs made the dig-buddies tired. They were working harder and harder, but in return they got excess fat to be deposited and insufficient proteins, minerals and vitamins.

The boy grew fatter that made him less active. The boy was no longer active and energetic. He didn’t like his new body.

He thought of checking with the dig-buddies, if every thing was ok? He peeped inside. The dig buddies looked dull and weak. He shouted, ‘Hey friends! What’s wrong?’

‘Give us energy!’ replied the gang. The boy was surprised. ‘But I am eating regularly, that too yummy food’ said the boy.

‘It may be yummy for the tongue!’ said the gang. ‘ But for us its hard to digest and imbalanced. We don’t get enough energy from what you eat.’

The boy was stunned. He looked at the heart. The heart was also panting. He gathered courage to ask the heart. ‘Hey heart! You don’t have to digest anything, why do you look exhausted’ asked the boy.

‘I don’t digest, my friend, but extra fat deposited in the body is the cause of my miserable condition. Because of the excess fat, I have to work harder to pump the blood all over the body’ said the panting heart.

‘O dear dig-buddies and my lovely heart! Please show me a way to come out of this situation. I can’t see my friends in trouble’ said the repenting boy.

‘Run, jump, exercise! Use the deposited fat and give us balanced nutrients from now on and we all will be fine’ replied the gang with enthusiasm.

After that the boy exercised regularly and did visit the fast food restaurant, but only once or twice in a month.

Then lived the boy, his heart and the dig-buddies happily ever after.