Why Liver Matters? 

Source of pictures: Pixabay.com

It was the end of the month again, and the house was going to be cleaned. Mom asked everyone to put everything they didn't need in the storage box. Daniel and dad went back to their rooms to clean up their "treasures". By the way, those are the things mom said they didn't need.

After a while, Daniel came out with a big box in his arms and put it into the storage box as mom said. He found that dad was writing a note on his box, naming the contents. Daniel saw it and wrote "dinosaur eggs, toy racing car and frisbee". He looked at dad's note curiously. He couldn't read all the words, but at least some of them – PRECIOUS AS HEART AND LIVER. "What is precious as heart and liver?" asked Daniel.

Dad looked mysterious and said, "It's very important. Let us never show them to anyone."

Daniel couldn't wait to open dad's box, but he kept it tight and taped it around. Daniel could not guess what the treasure was and begged dad to show him, but dad said no and kept it tighter. Daniel had no choice but to continue, "Dad, why do you call them precious as heart and liver? I know the heart is very important. People will die if the heart does not beat. But is liver important, too? Is it more important than the stomach? Without stomach, we can't digest food, and we will die of hunger. Why didn't you write precious as heart and stomach?"

Dad listened, patted his head, and said, "You little foodie. The stomach is important just because it can digest food? Remember that the liver helps digest, too. It is one of the three digestive glands in our body. The other two are salivary glands and the pancreas. Liver is the largest organ in your belly. The liver is dark red because it is full of blood vessels. When we are hungry or asleep for a long time, we rely on the energy from the substances stored in the liver. And, liver is the main detoxification organ of human body. A lot of substances we eat are metabolized in the liver, like alcohol and the medicine we take."

After hearing this, Daniel felt a kind of adoration for the liver, as if he suddenly realized that he had a powerful detoxifier in his body. It helped us wipe out all the toxic stuff we accidentally eat.

"What's even more interesting is that the liver can regenerate. Normally, most liver cells don't divide, but if someone hurts the liver or gets sick and the liver doesn't work properly, the liver cells will be stimulated to divide and grow to a normal size. Basically, the liver accounts for 3% of the body weight," dad carried the storage box up to the attic, talking as he walked. Daniel followed his dad, listening all the way.

Dad looked back at Daniel and continued, "the liver is so regenerative that it can be transplanted between living people. You can cut off a part of a healthy liver and transplant it to a patient in need. Over time, the healthy liver will grow back to its original size, and the transplanted liver will grow to a right size, too."

Daniel was surprised with his mouth wide open. Liver is awesome! It feels like the unkillable monster in the movie, oh, the unkillable Ultraman!

"But the liver is not immune to all poisons. Sometimes we eat too many toxic and harmful stuff, which can damage the liver. The most common is alcohol, and the liver can also be invaded by bacteria and viruses that cause hepatitis. So we'd better to get the hepatitis vaccine ahead of time during a hepatitis outbreak."

After hearing this, Daniel found that there's really no secret weapon in the body that can keep us healthy all the time. Even regenerative livers may get sick. 

Author: Huang Jing