Placenta Teddy Bear?

After giving birth, many women choose to have the placenta tossed out by hospitals. Some women are choosing less conventional ideas...

British designer Alex Green is taking people's placentas and turning them into teddy bears.

"I was very interested in how it was discarded unceremoniously as medical waste, why it's discarded and how we could bring it back…" said Green, who thought placentas deserved a symbolic treatment whether they're saved or not. "It was really about provoking a debate about placentas and how we treat them."

Green said that the placenta must first be cured with salt to kill the bacteria and remove water. He then softens it with eggs and tannins. Once the placenta is prepared, he sews it into the shape of the bear and fills it with brown rice.

"It's more heavy than you'd imagine -- they're more the sort of thing that you'd stick on a mantel pieces," Green told ABC. "It feels soft, somewhere between leather and suede but it's much more flexible than leather -- it's bendy."

Green knows that his idea isn't for everyone. "Of course a lot of people feel it's grotesque," said Green. "But, quite a few women have expressed interest in making them."

Many readers expressed disgust at the the concept. "This is just weird, and a gimmick, and yet one more thing to sit on a shelf, take up space, and collect dust. And, of course, lots of bucks for the 'artist' who thought it up," said LS on the blog ParentDish.

Added reader Ann, "Why turn the placenta into a teddy bear. That's disgusting...I think it's better to save the placenta and spinal cord in case the baby needs it to cure a disease in the future. It's called cord blood banking and so much more valuable than what has to be the most awkward teddy bear in the world."

But many treat the placenta with respect. Some cultures bury placentas and plant fruit trees on top of them as a living monument for the birth of their children. Discovery Green offers a how-to guide. Others believe that eating the placenta can be healthy for women who have just given birth. In Chinese medicine , eating placentas are said to replenish lost blood and nutrients. Some even believe it can help with postpartum depression.

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