Yes, you read that right. Placenta donation. Sounds weird, I know. It's my crunchy side showing up again, but as I mentioned to a friend recently, I hate for things to go to waste. That's what happens with most placentas - they go to waste. They are incinerated with a bunch of other medical waste. It's a little sad really because placentas are pretty cool organs. We all know they work wonders when in use. They provide the link between the mama and developing baby. After the baby is born however, placentas are often thrown out despite their quite awesome future potential.
In crunchier circles, placentas are known for having some amazing health properties. I'm not sure on all the details, but I did hear a story of how ingesting a piece of placenta soon after the baby is born can help to decrease excessive blood loss associated with some labors. Many people will actually save the placenta and send it to someone to encapsulate it and then the new mama takes a placenta pill every day. Ingesting placenta after the baby is born is rumored to keep away postpartum depression and help with milk supply among having other benefits. This is of course considered the more savory option for placental ingestion, but not the only one out there.
Being a typical American with that typical cringe that comes with the thought of ingesting the placenta, it wasn't something that I felt compelled to do. Neither was taking it home and planting it under a tree which is something that many people also do. In fact, once you start talking about or researching various things to do with the placenta, you run into all kinds of interesting (or gross, depending on your opinion) things that are done including having a lotus birth where the umbilical cord is never cut and the placenta is carried around with the baby until the umbilical cord falls off on it's own. Don't ask me how this is done, but feel free to Google it.
In one of the many colorful discussions in my mommy group when I was pregnant with my second, the subject of postpartum placenta use came up. One of the moms had heard that placentas are used in the training of search and rescue dogs. This instantly piqued my interest. As it turns out, placentas are the perfect thing for search and rescue training because it is a readily available human organ. It contains so many scent markers that only a very small sample is needed for training. I wanted to know more and I wanted this to be what was done with my placenta when my son was born.
That particular mom learned about this practice because a relative of hers works as a CSI. That relative works with a woman that is active in search and rescue that works with the local police department as well as others that may need their help (they were called out to help after the destruction of the World Trade Center among other disasters).
After getting contact information, I called up and let her know I was interested in donating my placenta. I learned many things in that discussion. She was definitely excited to have another placenta for her training since despite their commonality, they are rarely donated. Mine would actually be the first that she would obtain after a hospital birth since most that she receives come from home births or are saved by local birth centers. She was actually a bit concerned that if I was going to have a hospital birth, there might be some red tape that I'd have to deal with in order to obtain the placenta. That was something I had to look into.
I called the women's center at the hospital where I was planning my son's birth and asked what would need to be done. They had never heard of donating a placenta, and said to talk to my doctor. My doctor had also never heard of donating and he said it was about 15 years ago or longer since he had any patients that were interested in keeping the placenta. He had heard of some people planting a tree over a placenta many years ago. My doctor was on-board though and said he'd do whatever needed to be done.
As it turns out, all I needed to do was bring a cooler and a gallon size freezer bag to the birth for the placenta. I added the request to save it as part of my written birth plan and made sure that I discussed it with the staff when I went in for labor. Everything worked out great and after the baby was born, the placenta was brought back to our house and stored in the freezer by my in-laws. After that, all that was required was a phone call to the search and rescue trainer to let her know I had it and to coordinate our schedules for her to pick it up. And now I know, that my placenta didn't go to waste!
If you are interested or know someone who might be interested in donating a placenta to search and rescue, I'd recommend looking into it as early as possible. After first hearing about it, I tried to look up information online, but saw a few blogs or forum posts of people that had mentioned they'd done it or knew someone who did. No info was out there as to HOW to do it and rarely was any detail included in their posts. I tried to look up local search and rescue groups which also proved difficult. My suggestion would be to contact the local police department and see if they work with any local groups and go from there. I probably wouldn't have been able to donate mine without the connection from the mom in my mommy group, but I have to say, I'm super excited that I got the opportunity to help people out - not just those working in search and rescue, but also every person they are able to find and save because my of contribution to training those dogs!
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