We had planned on leaving Eliza’s umbilical cord attached, and as there were no complications during delivery, we were able to carry out this plan.
Eliza was born at 5:45pm, a Monday night.
By Tuesday afternoon, the cord had already turned hard, dry and brittle.
We cut the cord on Tuesday evening, around 5 inches from her navel.
The placenta had not had a chance to become smelly, and I did not soak it in salt water or prepare it with herbs.
We put the placenta in the freezer, pending finding a suitable tree to plant over it in our garden.
On Thursday morning (3.5 days later) the cord fell off.
We noticed a few spots of blood on her clothes for maybe a week (I do mean spots, and I do mean few – there was no steady bleeding whatsoever) and the area never became infected (I did not swab the area with anything.
And that was it.
A perfectly gentle, natural experience!