Time columnist Joel Stein took a short break from attending the delivery of his firstborn child to hustle his wife's placenta home in a cooler so the Placenta Lady could come cook it, dry it, and grind it into 120 long-lasting capsules. And of course, because he's a Time columnist, he videotaped the whole thing and then wrote about it.
A couple of things pop out, so to speak, from his afterbirth account, including how Time [automatically?] inserts links to their servicey sidebars :
In a fog, I drove the placenta home, where I wrapped the container in a bag and wrapped that bag in a bag and wrapped that bag in every remaining bag we had in the house. I slept at the hospital that night, grateful that my son will never remember what his parents just did. (See the top 10 iPhone apps for dads.)As if there were an iPhone app that would erase your kid's memory--or maybe prevent him from pulling up his dad's columns someday in Time freakin' Magazine.
But then there's this:
By law, Sara has to cook the placenta at the placenta owner's home. But to my great relief, she brought her own equipment, gloves, sponges and even more detergent than I'd hoped, scrubbing constantly as she worked. If I ever kill a man in my own home, I am totally calling the placenta lady. (See the top 10 scientific discoveries of 2008.)You can look up Time's top 10 suggestions for disposing of a body later. I want to know what is this law that prohibits you from having your placenta cooked and delivered like any other tasty, post-partum depression-thwarting meal--but that allows a placenta to be cooked in "the placenta owner's home"?
According to Placenta Benefits, the leading [only?] professional placenta encapsulation product and service provider, Certified Placenta Encapsulation Specialists must "adhere to the strictest standards of safety as set forth by OSHA and the EPA. They also conform to their local health department guidelines for food preparation and safety protocols." I'll look into it and get back to you.
They also dry the umbilical cord into the shape of a keepsake heart, which is just adorable.
Afterbirth: It's What's For Dinner [time.com via thingamababy]
If you want to cook, dry, and encapsulate your [sic] placenta yourself, PBi has a DIY kit [also via thingamababy]
Wow, he's annoying. I was kind of hoping the Placenta Lady would haul off and smack him at some point.
Sorry but you couldn't pay me to watch that. It sounds like the most disgusting thing ever. Isn't it cannibalism? Why would anyone want to consume body parts?