Use it or lose it: body, brain.... etc.

Image: Michal Marcol / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Wow! The body that you live in is amazing!

It does most things you want it to and a mountain of things that you don't even know it should - just to keep you alive!

How do you wake up? How are you able to put one foot in front of the other and call it walking?
The chemical cascades and chain of reactions that control the human body is an entire scientific area of study in itself.

But one simple concept that I'd like to discuss is the bodies very efficient use of energy - how do these two topics go together?

When you don't exercise regularly, you don't put as much strain on your muscles. Your body will make note of this and instead of wasting precious energy on keeping the muscles the same size, they will save energy by making the muscle smaller - more proportional to the activities and stresses that you apply to the muscle.

It is very much a case of "Use it or Lose it!".
All to conserve energy for a later date.

So this idea that if you don't use a muscle it will waste away shouldn't be new (it's one of the many reasons why regular exercise is necessary), but what about if you apply it to the brain and nervous system?

The brain and nervous system are made up of billions of nerve cells. These nerve cells pass signals to each other via links that exist between the cells. If you think of the nerve cells as towns and cities on a map, the connections are the roads that link them. The more traffic there is between two cities - the bigger the road needs to be to handle all of that traffic. On the other hand, a small town linked to another small town only needs a minor road linking it.

Lets have a look at a few different scenarios.

Memory: lets use language as an example. If you learnt German in high-school (and actually learnt it well) the more you speak the language, the better you get - this makes sense, the more you access that information, the stronger the connections become. Now lets say that you stop taking classes and have no need for the language anymore - if in 15 years you go to Germany, you may find that you will remember some words, but how likely is it that you will be able to carry on a fluent conversation? Those linguistic skills that you formed will have dissolved significantly. Use it or Lose it.

Spinal Movement: This is of particular interest to me simply because I'm a chiropractor. In the nerves that travel within the spinal column there are two groups that I'd like to discuss - nerves that feel pain (lets call these P), and nerves that feel movement (lets call these M). M nerves actually drown out P nerve signals - that is if there is movement, the pain isn't as bad. If you don't use these M nerves very much, won't the body will break down the connections? Of course it will, it would be a waste of energy to keep that strong connection there if it's not being used!

So if you work at a computer all day - are you moving your spine enough?
The most likely answer is No.

This means that you will feel back pain more easily, not just while you're at the desk but all the time - because that time at the desk has told your body to get rid of that connection!

Now here's what you can do about it:

    1.    Make sure that ever 20-30 minutes you actually stand up and move around the office, do some stretches if you can.
    2.    When you are sitting, make sure you're sitting in the correct posture - desk workers get worse arthritis than athletes these days - your posture really does matter.
    3.    Get some regular exercise. A 20 minute walk every day. Swimming every second day. It doesn't matter what it is, but do it, and do it regularly.

Image: graur razvan ionut / FreeDigitalPhotos.net