what can you do with a placenta?!?

Burial

Traditionally in many cultures placentas were buried as a ritual. Today, planting a tree with your child's placenta can be a meaningful way to honor your child and their placenta. 

Donate

Placentas can be donated to a training organization such as Placenta Training Company to teach others how to process placentas. 

Some police search and rescue dog training facilities will also take donated placentas to use in training.

Encapsulate

Encapsulating your placenta is just processing it in some manner and placing it into capsules. Anecdotally, consuming your placenta in capsule form can help balance your postpartum hormones so you do not experience extra overwhelm, sadness, depression, etc. Encapsulating tends to be the easiest and most mainstream form of consumption.

Artwork

Artwork can include umbilical cord keepsakes, placenta powder jewelry, placenta prints and more unusual items like the infamous placenta teddy bear. They are a way to create a special or ceremonial bond by creating, saving, and maybe displaying the organ that grew and sustained your baby's life prior to birth.

Placenta Tincture

A tincture is a concentrated extract of liquid (in most cases an alcohol) and herb which takes several weeks to infuse. Then the properties of the herb (or placenta) are within the liquid. Vanilla extract is a tincture.  Placenta tinctures are controversial both in and out of the placenta industry. Anecdotally, placenta tinctures are used for times of stress or emotional lows. Examples might be when your baby is weaning or when you return to work.

External Use Products

These products include salves and lotions most commonly. Other more unique uses include skin care products and shampoos.  Anecdotally, placenta products can aid in healing minor skin irritations, assist with anti-aging skin care, and help make hair grow faster and thicker. 

Placenta Smoothies

Placenta smoothies are just smoothies with placenta as an ingredient. They can be made shortly after birth with raw placenta or made with dried powder from a processed placenta. There are many different smoothie recipes available online.

Cooked as Food

There are many recipes on the internet for cooking your placenta either as food or in food products. Probably one of the most widely heard of food items are placenta chocolates or truffles. This is when processed placenta powder is placed inside chocolates. 

Disposed of as Medical Waste

Almost all placentas are disposed of as medical waste at this time.