She ate what?

I just read an article about the trend of women eating their own placentas after childbirth. I don’t know if it was the combination of my preternaturally strong gag reflex and the mildly strong rocking of the ferry this morning but I nearly threw up all over my neighbor’s Wall Street Journal. The article went on to detail how after the subject had her baby, her husband brought the placenta home in a Tupperware and gave it to a woman who specialized in cooking women’s placentas and turning them into super hormone pills. The placenta lady said business is booming. Who knew that creating placenta pills was a recession resistant business?

For me, this goes against the rules of nature and sanity. I’m no doctor but I thought the placenta is meant to dislodge and be expelled from the body after birth, having done its job of providing oxygen and food to the fetus while still in the womb. Nobody can convince me that saving it and ingesting it is somehow so beneficial for the body that I should fry it up in an iron skillet, dehydrate it and then ingest it in pill form (the article also said that some women drink it in shake format which is just so nasty I could hurl). So, go ahead earth mamas of the world! Get your placental freak on. This mom is definitely going to pass.