After my youngest son was born, my midwife held up my placenta to me so I could see it and invited me to look closer. I looked. It was like a huge slab of...organ. Liver? She held it lovingly, as if it was as precious as what I was holding, the tiny breathing brand-new human who had just made his entrance into the world.
Look! Placenta! gestured my midwife. Look what was inside you!
But look what I have, I gestured back with silent indifference, slightly adjusting my hold on my son. I'm pretty sure what I have is better.
Want to take it home? she asked.
I had heard of this, of course. Women who bury their placentas under a full moon, or under a tree, maybe. A spiritual thing. While aspects of that were certainly appealing to me, there was the problem of the...meatishness of it all. Ew.
So! On Mothertalkers there's a discussion of a practice called placentophagy, where the placenta is dried and processed into capsules to be consumed by its original owner. To ward off postpartum depression. Those who have tried it swear by it. (After all, it's good enough for Tom Cruise!) I totally have an open mind to things like this, only I will tell you right now that it's not for me. So what if most mammals consume their own "afterbirth"? Aren't they just being, I don't know, tidy?
So what do you think? Have you done this? Know anyone who has?
