#lymph

"Hand lymphatics." Human anatomy, including structure and development and practical considerations. 1911.

Flow of lymph. Circulation of blood. 1926.

Lymph Contract Holders

To keep your tissues in tip-top shape, anything that could harm them – from damaged cells to bacteria and viruses – needs to be removed. That’s where lymph comes in. This fluid collects waste products and harmful agents from tissues and transports them to lymph nodes for filtering. Lymph travels through collecting lymphatic vessels (cLVs) which contract to pump the fluid around the body. But where does this contraction-coordinating beat come from? To find cLVs’ so-called 'pacemaker' cells researchers used genetic engineering to fluorescently tag protein markers of different cell types in mouse cLVs (pictured). The shapes, gene expression and electrical activity of these cell types were then investigated to identify the pacemakers. It turns out the lymphatic muscle cells (green, bottom) running along the wall of the vessels are responsible.

Written by Lux Fatimathas

Image from work by Scott D Zawieja and colleagues

Department of Medical Pharmacology & Physiology, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO, USA

Image originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Published in eLife, September 2025

hardcorous - having hardcoric qualities (noun form: hardcority, can be shortened to harco)

louetal - a hardcoric individual, regardless of age (pronounced lau-ETT-ul)

corok - a younger hardcoric individual

harsprexan - an older hardcoric individual (plural: harsprexen)

from the words hardcore, loud, metal, rock, and expressive

and lymphagender (link) terminology!

lymphagine - having lymphagender qualities (noun form: lymphaginity; can be shortened to lym)

lymph / minaut - a lymphagender individual, regardless of age

lymy / miocea - a younger lymphagender individual (pronounced "limmy" and "mee-OH-shuh")

lymphain / miaquan - an older lymphagender individual (plural: lymphainen / miaquen)

from the words lympha (spring water in latin), min (masculine in nature), nautical, ocean, and aquatic

The golden key to health, wellness and longevity is the great Lymphatic system, which includes the interstitial spaces surrounding your cells.

Simply put, your body is a bunch of cells and two fluids: Blood and Lymph.

Cells make up your organs, glands, tissues, bones, etc. We are made up of trillions of cells. Some are so small that you can hardly see them. Others are as much as a foot long!

The spaces around and between your cells are called interstitial spaces. These spaces are full of fluids, predominately Lymphatic fluid with a little Blood.

You have an incredible amount of interstitial fluid. Think about it. It’s the fluid that connects every single cell in your body!

Think of the Blood as a nutritional delivery system to your cells, and the Lymph is the sewer system for waste extraction. Simply put: the Blood feeds the cells and the Lymph cleans the cells.

Interstitial fluid is largely Lymphatic fluid.

When you pop a pimple, what do you see? 3/4 Lymph fluid and 1/4 Blood. It is the same throughout the inside of your body. Your Lymphatic fluid is nearly 3/4 of the fluid inside your body.

This major system is nearly three times larger than the Blood. And yet...very little is actually known or understood about the body's Lymphatic system. Now, why do you think that is?

Not one course on Lymphology is being taught in any university, medical school or any other college in the US.

Even though the Lymphatic vessels are more extensive than the blood vessels and there is more Lymph than blood in the body, for every 200 pages in all the medical textbooks of anatomy, pathology and physiology, there is less than one page dedicated to share information about the Lymphatic system.

Why is it that doctors are not taught the Lymphatic system? It is the system where 99% of all disease originates. Why are they taught to look to the blood for answers?

Why is it that you can be full of pain and inflammation, have tumours all over your body, and have perfect Blood work?

This neglected area of research lays the scientific foundation of all the healing arts and reveals why it is possible for people to heal themselves without drugs, surgery, or medication of any kind.

Lymphatic fluid is a lipid-based fluid. When this fluid becomes stagnant, it dries up. Your interstitial spaces become dried. Your skin starts to dry. You may begin to experience dry mouth, dry eyes or start to cry acid (burning) tears. You're in trouble when acids start backing up and building up inside your body from a lack of kidney filtration.

An Acidic/mucus-forming diet of meat, eggs, dairy, starches, grains, refined sugars and processed foods will dehydrate and thicken Lymphatic fluid, turning it hard and compact.

Environmental toxins from drinking water, household cleaning products, personal hygiene products, paint, dust, etc., etc., can all negatively impact the health of your interstitial fluids.

Negative emotions and thoughts also create Acidic hormones which are further detrimental to this system!!

Interstitial fluid should be somewhere around 7pH. This keeps it fluid and moving.

But, when there’s too many Acidic foods in your diet the pH lowers as the fluid hardens. Minor changes in pH are enough to harden this fluid.

What do you think happens to your cells when they are encased in thickened, hardened fluid and mucus? Nutrition can’t get in and waste can’t get out. ("deficiencies" anyone?)

Cellular metabolic waste is around 3.5 ph. When this Acid medium becomes trapped in the interstitial spaces it deteriorates the cell until the cell loses function. Acids burn, deteriorate and break things down. There are no two ways about it!

What does this mean? It means that if you’re experiencing any type of health challenge or breakdown of cellular structure and function, your interstitial fluid is too

Acidic and has hardened. Water won't hydrate the cells interstitially. Lymph is a lipid (oily, cholesterol based) fluid. You need the fatty acids and astringency of fruits to break up hardened lymph.

You’ll feel this effect as pain and inflammation in the body, until the breakdown of cells sets in. That’s when you get medical diagnosis of organ and gland failure or worse...abnormal cells.

It can take decades for the accumulation of waste to damage cellular structure to a point where you feel it. In reverse, it can take several years of dedication to clean your body and regenerate healthy cells.

Note: We all inherit a compromised Lymphatic system at birth, and to what degree explains quite a bit when comes to childhood "disease."

How long it takes to clean out the terrain depends on a number of factors:

1.) how long you have been misfeeding the body inappropriate foods,

2.) how dehydrated your body is (lymphatically dehydrated and congested),

3.) how quickly you transition,

4.) how much nerve energy you have available to clean once you correct the diet,

5.) how much time you can dedicate to resting and sleep. Getting adequate sleep and moderate exercise can help to speed the cleaning process as can intermittent fasting, juice feasting and eating more water-rich fruits.

An Alkaline-forming diet full of living foods such as fruits, berries, melons, greens and vegetables in their natural state will rehydrate and cleanse the interstitial fluid keeping it fluid in its consistency.

All our cells need to be serviced on site with feeding and cleaning. Our diet supplies the chemistry and physics to do both when our primary food source includes ripe and organic (pesticide-free) fruits, berries and melons.

Regenerative Detoxification unlocks the doors and eliminates obstructions to health so that you can look and feel your best and most vital self.

What you eat, what you drink, what you put on your skin, what you think and feel determines the status of your health. If you’re unhappy with your health, then change these things.

(By Lauren Whiteman, Ivan Bortic. Visual: Monica Lubanska)

Adaptable Polarity

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Another #acupressure image from the archives! This one is lymphedema for the leg done over a decade ago in massage school.

I was speaking with a brilliant colleague last night about this one, and it just seemed to make sense.

These depicted points all seem to land on powerful locations of venous return between the tibial or great saphenous veins.

No venous return, no lymphatic drainage.

There’s also another implication here to the importance of dorsi flexion of the foot and movement of the arch to get fluids moving.