Eating your Placenta to prevent PPD... - Page 2

[pamamidwife]

I've heard such wonderful things about this. A client of mine worked with a local acupuncturist for specific directions and raved about it.

[Mom2baldie]

Pam,

Do you know the specific instructions? Or any tips on doing this? If so, would you mind sharing them?

[majazama]

I had a feeling like bumping this would be a good idea I'm getting closer to my due date. I'm going to steam my placenta first like it's suggested in one of the previous links posted (I'll get it up again after this post). So I need to get a steamer. I don't have one. But apparently it's good to kind of cook it so that it's not too cooling (like they say in traditional chinese medecine)...

Anyways, I hope we can all avert getting PPD by doing this!

(Eddited because the placenta has to be cooked in a STEAMER not a double boiler)

[majazama]

directions on how to prepare placenta for drying.....http://www.geocities.com/virtualbirth/placenta.html

[Lucysmama]

Mamajaza,

Please LMK how you do it, and what the results are! I am also planning to do this...or contemplating it.

No way am I going to just EAT it, that totally skeeves me out, but I can dig on doing the capsules.

And good luck on your birth! You're getting so close!!!!

[brandywine]

Does this go with white wine or red?

[majazama]

Lucy'smama~~thanks for the well wishes!! I hope it all turns out all right with the placenta preparation, and the healthy baby too, of course.:LOL


brandywine~~white wine!

[corysmilk]

I would eat a small peice raw, like wash it down with some wine right after the birth. Because the whole drying and capsuale thing takes many many hours? right? I deffenatly will be doing this If I ever have any more children.
I suffer from detramental PPD
Good luck mamajaza

[luvinmama]

Thank you so much for starting this thread. I had never heard of eating the placenta before, but now it sounds like something I NEED to do. I had horrible ppd with ds#1 and am petrified of going though that again. Thanks for all the links everyone. I think I'll try a few bites (once my super conservative/shocked at hbing mom leaves the house) and then make the capsuls so it'll last a few weeks. Now I just have to figure out where we can hide it from my mom as she'll be going through our house and kitchen helping us out for about a week.

[majazama]

I started a post before, then my DD turned off the PC. So I'll make it short...

luvinmama~ That sounds like a tough situation. I think it's best to prepare the placenta as soon as possible. You probably don't want to freeze it, or have it in the fridge for a week.

Here's what I'm doing with mine (following the directions in one of those links)...
1. rinsing it off good
2. letting a lot of the surface blood to drip off
3. steaming it for 15 min on each side (till it doesn't drip blood when you cut it)
4. slicing it in 1/8 " strips
5. throwing it in the dehydrator till so dry that it snaps when broken
6. grinding it in the coffee grinder, and putting it into vegicaps
7. taking it with champagne, as is recommended somewhere

Maybe do this before your mom comes to help. You can always tell her to come later.... it's YOUR baby, birth, and placenta.

Good Luck~~HTH~~

[majazama]

Well, I thought I should update this thread, as I had my baby on july 9th........

So, my placenta came out after the baby and this is what I did with it----->
put it in the fridge as soon as the baby's cord was cut.

I didn't get around to looking at it much till about 2 days later, when I made myself "deal" with it (NO PROCRASTINATION).

I rinsed it off in the sink (which I later read that You don't have to do) and cut off the umbilical cord (to save for my DD)

I then placed the placenta inside of it's membranes (amniotic sac) and put it in a steamer with as little water as possible, a few peices of ginger, hot pepper, and lemon ( as advised in the directions I posted earlier)

steamed in on each side for 15 minutes (you might want to open the windows and turn on the kitchen fan if you don't want to smell it)

Then I left it in the fridge overnight to cool down. Once it was cool, I cut it into as thin as possible strips, stuffed it into the dehydrator, and left it over night in a room that isn't used much with the window open with the dehydrator sitting next to the window

So, I had my dried placenta, and I put it in the freezer in it's unground form in a glass jar (safe, and I didn't have to deal with it any more). I took it out a few weeks later, ground it easily in the coffee grinder, and encapsulated two vegicaps with it.

--------------------------------------------------------------
things I learned from this experience ... don't leave the placenta in the dehydrator overnight, it gets kind of burnt. Check on it often. Something I knew before I did this, do it as soon as possible after everything is settled.

I find that I don't feel the need for the placenta now that I've done it all. When I took the two "placenta caps", I kept burping up the flavor and it seemed like it was quite hard for my body to digest. But that could be because my placenta looked kind of unhealthy. It was hard for me to eat well in this pregnany as I had a rambuncious nursing toddler, and little cash to buy good food.

I also had an unassisted birth, so I felt quite empowered after the baby was born, rather than drained. I think that was a big part of why I was depressed after my first DD was born.

So I have perfectly ground dried placenta in my freezer. I'm thinking I will keep it forever. I've read recently that it's good for menopausal women, so I might use it then. And I also read that it can be good for when the baby has her first "night away" from mommy. I'm just not depressed, so I don't feel the need to fix something that ain't broken KWIM?

I really hope more women give special attention to their placentas, as they are so magikal... wheather you dry it, bury it, or whatever, it was a part of you and can really help you if you are feeling blue.

[Mom2baldie]

Thanks for updating!

[be11ydancer]

Well, as I was reading this thread, I thought, "Hmm. Maybe it's not such a gross thing. Sounds healthy and healing. Maybe, just maybe." And then I clicked on the link for pictures of it. No thank you. I'm sorry, I just can't. I agree with the other poster, that it seems slightly cannibalistic. I also have a very hard time touching raw meat with my bare hands, or swishing poopie diapers in the toilet. So maybe I'm just a wimp.

I think that if you want to do something like that, then go for it. Just not my thing. This will definetely make for interesting conversation with my DH.



ETA:
Oh, I posted before I read the update. Congrats on your birth! I'm glad that this seemed to work for you. O.K. So maybe I could swallow the capsules if someone else completely prepared them for me and I didn't have to smell it or see it raw. Maybe.

[greensmile]

If you can't deal with the placenta have someone else ready to handle it, I've done caaps and it gives you a energy boost, felt right to me, also a fan of lotus birth, wich I've done twice when I felt I didn't need to eat the placenta (3x)

[hippiemom2]

Well, I had some of my placenta right after birth in a shake. It was very good and I didn't taste the placenta at all. It was made with cream and strawberries, bananas, and kiwi whipped together in a blender with a couple of the pieces tossed in. It made me feel so energized right after the birth. I was really feeling drained afterwards since I hadn't slept through the night but after the shake I was fine. I never had PPD so I don't think this was a factor. I do have Crohn's disease and it is difficult for me to get the nutrients that I need. Using the placenta to regain some of those seemed only natural to me.

The rest I used to plant a tree. I am growing my daughter a California Redwood with that placenta. Some day I hope we can take a trip into the redwoods and plant it together. But, it is starting to really take off and may be too big before we make it back there. I guess Bellingham will just have to have a California Redwood growing somewhere. LOL!

Congrats to the mama who had an unassisted. I am glad to hear that everything went well and you and baby are doing well.

Peace,
Shelbi

[jecaly]

thanks for posting your experiences with this, mamajaza and hippiemom! i'm planning to do basically a combination of what you two did, so it's great to hear real live mdc experiences with it.

i'm sort of fascinated by the whole a-part-of-yourself-you-can/should-eat thing. it's sort of pleasing and dizzying from a cyclical perspective, as well as for the health benefits. i'll keep you guys posted in november!

*jennifer

[vespersongs]

Cornelia Enning's book

I posted this on a couple other related boards...since there seemed to be a few discussions going on!

You should keep an eye out for Cornelia Enning's book to be published by Midwifery Today, coming out within the next few months. It's called Placenta Recipes or somethign very similar.

I saw her speak in Denmark at the MT conference a few weeks ago and I previously had considered the placenta eating thing gross with a capital G. but now I see it VERY differently.

She talked abotu drying the placenta in the oven and pulverizing it into a powder which can be used for many things, including butt balm for the baby!!!! But also for PPD and other things.

[milk4two]

No way would I have the energy for that postpartum.

[mamamoo]

You could check with your midwife. Mine directed me to a mama that dries and capsulizes it for people. I think it was $50. It is so worth it!! I swear my experience was amazingly different than my previous birth(also at home). PPD many times gets worse with each birth(mine did until the placenta). I only wish I had known about it with my first birth...

[cottonwood]

"No way would I have the energy for that postpartum."

No, me either. I have a hard time asking for help, but I think this is one task I'd be happy to delegate! If I were to have another baby I would definitely do it.