Holly Madison has plans to eat her placenta after giving birth.
As Us Weekly first reported, Madison revealed that she will have her placenta turned into pills after her baby girl is born next month. Although it might sound unusual, many other mothers have done the same, as ingesting the placenta is said to aid recovery and help postpartum depression.
The former Playboy model revealed her placenta plans on her Celebuzz blog Wednesday.
Via Celebuzz:
This might sound gross, but I’m totally planning on having my placenta turned into pills I can take after giving birth. I heard it helps women recover faster and I want to recover as quickly as I can!
How does it work?
The woman's placenta is cleaned, cooked, dried and made into ingestible capsules. Some women choose to eat it raw, cooked or blended into smoothies. In a blog for HuffPost Science, behavioral neuroscientist Mark Kristal said women think eating the placenta can help or reduce "postpartum depression, 'baby blues,' fatigue, lactational insufficiency and hormone deficiencies."
Madison is not the first celebrity to jump on the placenta trend. "Mad Men" actress January Jones, for one, has admitted she ate her placenta after the birth of her son, Xander, in 2011.
“Your placenta gets dehydrated and made into vitamins,” she told People magazine. “It’s something I was very hesitant about, but we’re the only mammals who don’t ingest our own placentas. It’s not witch-crafty or anything! I suggest it to all moms!”
Placenta capsulation is not FDA-approved, ABC News notes, but it has become more and more popular as pregnant women turn to practices like midwifery and home births. Despite its nutritional value, the placenta hasn't been scientifically proven to help any ailments.
“There is certainly a potential medicinal use,” Dr. David Katz, founder of the Yale Prevention Center, previously told ABC News. “This is a time-honored cultural practice of eating the placenta. It is nutrient-rich and a source of hormones.”