Hill Country Placentas

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

I am so incredibly grateful for all of you. I am honored to serve my clients during such a special moment in their lives. Forever thankful.

Now, let’s eat!!

Check out this beautiful long cord keepsake!

It’s October! Here is a scary face of an umbilical cord after having just been cut!

In reality what you see here is the two arteries and the vein of the cord that transport oxygen, nutrients, and waste products back and forth between the placenta and the baby!

A beautiful heart shaped placenta that was in the kitchen this week. A beautiful organ that nourished and grew a human being. Such an extraordinary miracle.

Cord keepsakes for a set of twins today. ❤️❤️

As a former NICU respiratory therapist I highly encourage delayed cord clamping.

Delayed cord clamping is so important for baby!

🩸It increases haemoglobin levels at birth and improves iron stores for the first 6 months of life.

🩸If baby is preterm (and full term) it can help to improve transitional circulation, improve the building of red blood cell volume and blood cell flow to vital organs, decreases the need for blood transfusions and lowers the chance of necrotising enterocolitis and intraventricular haemorrhage

🩸Transfers up to 1/3 of babies blood back to them that’s inside the placenta. This blood is also full of white blood cells that help fight infections, antibodies and stem cells.

🩸Less need for oxygen stimulation because they’re attached to their oxygen supply still

🩸Decreases the risk of anemia

🩸Babies have a higher birthweight

🩸Better cardiopulmonary adaptation

🩸Increased duration of early breastfeeding

🩸Stabilises infant blood pressure

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Lauren Marsh
Doula

Beautiful cord keepsake in the kitchen today!

YES! You can encapsulate your placenta if...

1. You have a hospital birth
2. You have a home birth
3. You deliver at a birth center
4. You are GBS positive
5. You have a c-section
6. You have an epidural
7. You have pitocin
8. You have antibiotics
9. If your baby passes meconium
10. If you are over due
11. If your placenta has calcifications
12. If you are a last minute client

And if you can encapsulate even if your care provider does not "agree" with it. It is YOUR body, YOUR placenta, and YOUR choice!

Baby classes!

Bring your baby and come hang out with Laura Hill Monday and Thursday mornings to learn some super fun play, bonding and engagement classes!! This class is for babies 6 weeks to not yet crawling. Link in bio to sign up! DM with questions.

Love this framed print that was done this weekend for a sweet mama.

So interesting! Link to actual study in comments.

A study from 1918 found that infants who were breast-fed by mothers having ingested dehydrated placenta had faster weight gain than in the control group where placenta was not consumed.

Hammett F S. The Effect Of The Maternal Ingestion Of Desiccated Placenta Upon The Rate Of Growth Of Breast-Fed Infants. J Biol Chem. 1918;36:569–573.

Happy Mother’s Day to all!!

Another cord this week with a true knot! You can see the knot on the left side of the cord.

Twin placentas in the kitchen today! One boy and one girl. Born safely at home!

They told you about the sleepless nights, but no one really told you how deep the darkness could be. How long and lonely the hours could feel, feeding a tiny human at your breast, ⁠your bones aching with exhaustion while all the world slept. ⁠
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They didn’t tell you how you’d scan the horizon, praying for the first sign of light, ⁠Relief but also the crushing thought that you’d face another day on so little sleep.⁠
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They told you about the sleepless nights, but no one told you there would be sweet magic there too✨
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The cozy comfort of love in your arms⁠. Just you and your baby and the gentle glow of the streetlight through the window⁠.
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Sleepy midnight cuddles
The warm thought of so many mamas around the world feeding in the moonlight with you⁠.
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They told you about the sleepless nights, but no one told you that breastfeeding would be such a wild ride-- the deepest valleys and highest peaks.
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Challenging and beautiful and painful and incredible and messy and amazing and everything in between 💞

Spirit Y Sol ❤️

The cord keepsake from yesterdays beautiful cord with two knots. The perfect keepsake for this baby’s mama. You can see one knot is the O and the other knot is part of the V.

A cord with two true knots in it. This baby was born at a birth center today with a midwife. Knots occur in about 1 in 100 cords. Most knots do not cause issues with the baby.

The umbilical cord contains an important substance, called Wharton's jelly, that provides cushioning to the available vessels and protects the umbilical cord, even when a knot occurs. This jelly helps decrease the chance of the knot becoming too tight and cutting off oxygen to the baby.

Mother Nature is miraculous. ❤️

Such a cute cord keepsake in the kitchen today!

Happy Valentine’s Day to all of our sweet families!! We hope your day has been filled with love and sweets! Here are some recent umbilical cords keepsakes we’ve created in the kitchen!

A fact about the placenta!

When the mother is pregnant the placenta transfers antibodies from the mother immune system to the baby. These antibodies give the baby immune protection for 3-6 months after the baby is born.

We are frequently asked; “Can we delay cord clamping and still encapsulate?”

Answer- “Absolutely!”

It’s so important to let the baby have all of its blood!

We now know that it is better to allow a baby time to regulate its own blood volume and take the blood that it needs from the placenta after birth.
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Early cord clamping can lead to increased rates of anaemia and decreased neurological (brain) development.
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It is crucial that a baby is allowed to complete their own transition to optimal condition outside the uterus without any interference from cord clamping.
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But not all babies are equal and some will need more time than others. Each baby’s transition from intrauterine life to extrauterine life is a very individual process.
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For this reason, it is not always helpful to use arbitrary time limits to determine how long to wait before clamping and cutting the cord.
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Unless there is a problem (such as a tear in the cord or the mother is bleeding heavily), it may be better to watch the condition of the baby than to use arbitrary time limits.
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People may find it helpful to use the phrase “wait for white” to describe how the cord looks white and floppy once the transition is complete and the baby has adjusted to life outside the womb.
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This post has been created by Amanda Burleigh and Sara Wickham
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For references and evidence-based information on optimal cord clamping, placental birth and related issues, please see www.waitforwhite.com and www.sarawickham.com
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You may also enjoy the “Optimal Cord Clamping/” page and “Birthing Your Placenta” by Nadine Edwards and Sara Wickham.

It is 2022 so it is time for our yearly public service announcement....

Meconium is NOT a contraindication for encapsulation. Testing positive for GBS is NOT a contraindication for encapsulation.

Do NOT let your doctor or nurse tell you that you can’t encapsulate with these conditions. They DO NOT know what they are talking about!

Another year is wrapping up here in the placenta kitchen! Hard to believe!

We are excited for 2022 and to continue to walk with our clients on their postpartum journey.

We are so honored to serve our birth community and appreciate all of the support and trust you have placed in us over the last decade.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

We are available 7 days a week/ 365 days a year! Rain or shine or snow!

We get calls frequently from frantic new parents that start like this; “we hired another encapsulator but she’s sick and we had our baby today!” or “we hired another encapsulator but she had to go out of town and we had our baby today!” or “we just had a baby and just now decided we want to encapsulate.”

The answer is always; “We are happy to help!”

We are available 365 days a year for all placenta needs!”

Happy Thanksgiving! We are so grateful to the families that allow us the privilege of walking along side them during their postpartum period. We are truly blessed to be a part of such a special time. We hope you all enjoy this day with your families!

We are hiring! This is a very flexible, part-time position in our commercial kitchen. Please email [email protected] if you are interested and let us know about yourself!

We had twins in the kitchen this week and they both had long cords! Karly did their first initial with their cords for the cord keepsakes. Super cute!!!

Welcome to the world, B & L!!!

I see you!

Our candle is lit this week for a sweet mama in memory of her daughter. May she be surrounded with love and peace in the coming days and months ahead.

We have been keeping busy over here at the placenta kitchen! Check out these two beautiful prints done this week with the gold cords. Both done by Karly who is fabulous at prints!

If you are pregnant and not on our schedule yet...where are you?! Reserve with us today!

Hi! We hope you are all staying warm and have enough food and water during this crazy time!

Even during once in a lifetime snow storms babies are still born and we are still working! We have had three babies born this week. We have picked up the placentas although a little late for a couple of them due to road conditions. If you are due right now, please still call or text us when your baby arrives and we will let you know when we can pick up.

We promise we will get to you! Stay safe!

We can create a precious cord keepsake even from the smallest of cords. This little heart was created with the loving hands of Liz. ❤️

Happy New Year from Hill Country Placentas!

2020 is finally behind us and hopefully we are on to bigger and better things in 2021!

No matter what happens though babies are always being born! We are honored and blessed to have served 487 families in 2020! We had multiple repeat clients this year and have now encapsulated for some families for the 4th time!

We thank our clients and those that refer to us from the bottom of our hearts. We love you all!

Cheers to 2021 and we look forward to serving families as we enter our 11th year of business!

Beautiful cord keepsake with a true knot in the cord!

I see it time and time again.⠀
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From people with big names. Bloggers. Celebrities. Doctors. Friends. Neighbors. Strangers in the grocery store. Family. ⠀
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It's everywhere!⠀
The rules, the separation, the conflicting information.⠀
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And it's overwhelming for parents. One person says something, and another says something completely different.⠀
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But the fact is, that anything that is going against your baby's natural lead or your instincts and mama gut, is WRONG. ⠀
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You don't have to push your baby away from you to have an independent child.⠀
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You don't have to leave your baby in a closed room so they "learn" how to be a "good sleeper."⠀
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You don't have to stop rocking your baby, cuddling your baby, nursing your baby to sleep, comfort, just for the hell of it.⠀
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And please don't take advice from people who are telling you to purposefully stretch or skip feeds. Whether it is day or night.⠀
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It's so freeing to let go of all of this noise. To unfollow the narrative. ⠀
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To trust that you know best, and that millions of years of evolution are not wrong.

If you are waiting on an email from us, please check your spam mailbox. We seem to have made it on a list somewhere that believes we are spammers! Thank you gmail. 🙄

Another beautiful placenta print done by Karly. ❤️

📣𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐃𝐎 𝐍𝐎𝐓 𝐍𝐄𝐄𝐃 𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐌𝐈𝐒𝐒𝐈𝐎𝐍📣

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How in the world did we get to the place where you need to ask your provider for permission for anything?
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Engaging in a parent/child type relationship with your provider is a recipe for the hijacking of your birth.
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Why? Because we were always taught to be obedient little children.
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Your provider is not your mommy/daddy and you are not their child.
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The words “allow” or “let me” don’t belong in birth.
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You don’t need anyone to “allow” you to do anything or “let you” do anything.
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You are a grown adult who can make your own grown decisions.
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And the law says you have the right to act as an autonomous adult as well.
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If you want to squat, then squat.
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Stop asking for permission.
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Your provider needs to ask YOU for permission.
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PhotoCred: doulaviewllc
Caption:

Beautiful framed print going home today. The parents requested the extras added to it to really personalize it for them. So sweet. We are always happy to accommodate special requests.

Beautiful cord keepsake and print going to a client today. ❤️