8 August

One of the greatest misunderstandings about the body I think is that the skeleton is like a solid frame that all the tissues and organs are then hung on. Bones are tissues too, they change depending on the forces on your body. Bones aren’t a frame that holds you up, they’re spacers for other tissue, holding it apart to allow it to stretch elastically. You’re an elastic bundle of tissue, bones included. You can see it in the foot. It’s easy to think of the foot as a solid thing you drop onto the ground. But the foot is 3 suspended elastic arches. Your foot is more like a trampoline. Look at the X ray (that’s my foot btw). The bones make no sense at all as a frame. They’re spacers, stretching out other tissue to create that trampoline structure. ‘Collapsed arches’ can be any or all of the 3, not just the most famous arch we all see.