Photo by Carrie Sandoval/Courtesy of Flickr

Our second child was born on April 22 - Earth Day. Due to the fact that our first child weighed 9 pounds, 12 ounces, she ended up being born via C-section. That in turn prompted us to take our doctor’s advice and schedule a C-section for our second baby. 

I’m not going to lie and tell you that I was extremely happy with how ‘planned’ out everything seemed. The excitement my husband and I experienced during this uneventful morning paled in comparison to the 22-hour rollercoaster of labor fun we had with our first. I’ve come to realize that all of those crazy details that have become “our story” about the birth of our first child have also become quite treasured to her.

I remember thinking that morning about what fun details I could possibly contrive from this sterile experience to tell my daughter when she asks about the day she was born. It was no more than a few minutes later that a doctor/researcher came in to our room. He explained he was doing a study on the effects of environmental toxins found in a woman’s placenta. He wanted to get samples from a varied group of women, and see whose placenta was the healthiest (i.e. contained the least number of toxins) and why. He then asked if I would be willing to donate my placenta to research in just a few minutes after my baby was born.

My first thought was “Ugh…darn this teaching hospital here in Ann Arbor… they always have something to bother the patient with!” I am an avid learner, and I get that this is one way medical students learn - but seriously, shouldn’t pregnant women be exempt from this responsibility?

Anyway, because I do live a “non-toxic” life as much as possible(especially while pregnant) , I realized this could be not only an awesome thing to do for medical science - but what a special thing to do in honor of my baby being born on Earth Day! I had gone to such great lengths to avoid anything harmful everyday for nine months; I figured I had a pretty good looking placenta. So, I proudly told him “yes, I would love to give you my carefully crafted placenta that I worked so hard to keep free of chemicals.” 

He thanked me, and a short time later he was gifted a small part of our little miracle. Sophia Isabella was born healthy and loud. I was so amazed at the sight of her that I quickly forgot about any worries I had about the morning.

I never did get to find out the results of this study, but I did get a neat story to tell my Earth Day baby.

Sara Arsenault is a full time stay at home mother of two, a community volunteer and a contributor to the Parenting section of AnnArbor.com She welcomes your thoughts and comments at searsen@live.com.