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How Water Becomes Urine
A fluid’s journey through the body is long and interesting. When you take a drink of water your mouth becomes moist and it feels nice to swallow.
The water runs down your throat, past the epiglottis (the flap that closes to stop water going into your lungs), and on down through the oesophagus into your stomach.
The Stomach
In your stomach the water is needed to assist in the processing and digestion of your food. So far your body hasn’t absorbed any water, all that’s happened is your thirst has been quenched and the amount of saliva you produce has increased.
The water and the food in your stomach are mixed into dough and kneaded out into your intestines.
The Small Intestine
This is where your body starts to absorb fluid as well as vitamins and other nutrients from the dough. These nutrients are absorbed by the blood and transported to all your body’s cells.
In the small intestine, the food is so finely kneaded that it doesn’t resemble food any more; it looks rather like raw cake mix. After a while the mixture leaves the small intestine and continues onto your large intestine.
The Large Intestine
The large intestine’s task is to absorb as much liquid as possible from the mixture going through it, this is so that your body can make use of the liquid and achieve a proper balance of bodily fluids. This is important, as 60% of your body is water.
The Kidneys and the Bladder
The liquid you drink is absorbed by the blood vessels in your large intestine and is transported by the blood to your kidneys. The kidneys act as filters for the blood and they purify it. The excess water that is not used is converted into urine, which then flows through tubes called the ureters into the bladder.
When the bladder contains 200ml to 400ml of urine you will usually need to go to the toilet.
Click on the links to the left to see how other parts of your body are involved in this process.
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