The Wonderful Placenta!
Photo by João Paulo de Souza Oliveira on Unsplash
The beautiful Placenta. What an amazing organ it is!
That’s right, it is in fact an organ however it a temporary one. It is grown alongside baby during the first trimester (usually around six days after fertilisation) and expelled after baby is delivered. It can grow either posterior (back) or anterior (front). You may notice that you will feel kicks earlier if you have a posterior placenta.
The Placenta is something that mum and baby work on together. Part of the placenta develops from the tissue of the mothers wall, (called the basal plate) while part is from the baby’s tissue (chorionic plate). In the middle of these two plates is a pool of blood that is mums. Inside this pool of blood, the arteries and veins coming from mum’s tissue that penetrate and form a tree like structure and the maternal blood and metal blood do not mix but they come in close contact. The Placental membrane things transfer or defuse from maternal blood into fatal blood. Blood vessels spread across its surface like the wide, billowing branches of a tree.
The Placenta is responsibly for providing oxygen, eliminating waste, providing nutrients, facilitating blood flow, regulating temperature and all round serves as a protective barrier for baby. The baby gets the benefits through the umbilical cord which connects to the placenta contains two arteries and a vein, wrapped in something called ‘’Whartons Jelly’’. The umbilical arteries contain deoxygenated blood that goes away from the baby and the umbilical vein carries all the good oxygenated blood that is full of nutrients that carries away from the placenta and into the baby.
Culturally, there are quite a few different ways that the Placenta can be honoured. For example, Chinese medicine and Western culture it is not unusual for women to get their Placenta encapsulated to be digested. Many believe that this can provide support with hormones and give women a better postpartum period. A more uncommon practice, although it seems to be coming more common is a Lotus birth. A Lotus birth is when you leave the umbilical cord connected to the Placenta until it naturally gives way (generally around the 3-10 day mark).
Aborigines and First Nation people have been known to have spiritual services that include song, dance and smoking ceremonies while burying the Placenta whilst Maori folk like to bury the Placenta and umbilical cord on the Childs tribal land to connect the child with their birth space.
However you wish to honour your Placenta is up to you, but there is no denying how magical this organ truly is and what a gift it is to be able to grow this organ to nature our baby.
