I would have loved to have been able to donate an umbilical cord for stem cell research. Unfortunately, there only seems to be one hospital in London that 'harvests' donated cords and it isn't the hospital I'll be using.

Now I'm faced with continuing a custom knowing nothing about how to go about it.

In Japan, the umbilical cord is kept and the baby ends up with it.

What advice is given to Japanese mothers who give birth outside Japan in order to accomplish this?

I've seen these boxes - is this the sort of thing I should be asking ojiisan to bring from Tokyo?

MrLapLap says he has his stored somewhere, but I'm not going to be able to see it until it's way past the point of no return with this new cord so I've no idea what dried Japanese cords typically look like (do they have ribbons? are they dried into a standard shape?). As you can imagine, it's not something I want to be giving much thought to at the crucial moment - now is a much better time.

Wow, this is a curious little bit of inter-cultural knowledge.

The box in that picture looks suspiciously like one that the Park Hyatt leaves in my room with a candy treat once in a while. Hopefully, the dimensions are different, or I'll start to wonder what is in that candy treat!

To illiterate folks like ourselves it also looks just like any box used to pack and present ceramics, glass or any other artesan made item or kimono accessory.

I think in this case what makes the box special is the writing on it that I assume says something along the lines of "Umbilical Cord Box" and the fact that it is made of paulownia (kiri) wood - helps protect the yummy, yummy contents resist the appetite of many generations of intrepid insects.

Cord blood harvests (for either stem cell transplants or stem cell research) don't involve retaining the cord, but the blood that's expressed from the cord.

As for keeping the umbilical cord, is it the entire umbilical cord? Or a segment of the cord? Or the "stump", the bit between the baby's belly button and the clamp that's applied at delivery. If it's the last then you'll leave the hospital with it still attached to your baby, and once it dries up and detaches (several days later) you can put it in the box.

If you need more of the cord then you could ask your OB to get it for you at the time of delivery if he/she doesn't see any reason for it to be sent to pathology for examination (for infection, vascular abnormalities, etc.). The placenta and attached cord are typically put in the trash in any case.

A friend of mine who gave birth to her second child in Japan many years ago was astonished when the nurses presented her with the baby's umbilical cord. (Her first child had been born in the States.)

She asked what it was for, and the nurses told her that if anyone ever doubted that she was her son's mother, she could present the umbilical cord as proof.

This was before the days of DNA testing, so she asked how anyone would know that it was the right umbilical cord anyway, but the nurses just shrugged.

I've worked with adult Japanese males whose umbilical cords were never severed.

http://www.kch.nhs.uk/news/archive/2...ng-cord-blood/
You're right. Unfortunately, that doesn't change the fact that there's only one place in London where you can donate the blood (scheme is called Kingscord)

That was pretty much my question. I have no idea.

This anatomical curiosity is in no way restricted to males from Japan. It's especially common among Italians.

Sounds like it's pretty much the whole length of the cord. I'd mention it to my OB (as well as anybody else in the practice who is likely to be covering for him/her when the time comes) in advance so as to forestall the placenta's being pitched in the trash before the cord's been removed. They're pretty slimy, so a ziploc bag will come in handy for getting it home, and I'd keep it refrigerated if it's going to more than a couple of hours until you can get somewhere to lay it out to dry. No idea whatsoever as the final shape, but clearly the dimensions need to fit in the container supplied.

As this is a custom based on tradition I'm not keen on just 'winging it' based on conjecture and common sense.

If anyone has any firm idea of what's actually involved in keeping a heso no o (へその緒) I'd be very grateful for some facts.

I'm already hard at work researching okuizome (お食い初め)
http://images.google.com/images?hl=e...-8&sa=N&tab=wi
And much relieved to discover that there is a legitimate way to celebrate the new arrival with friends and family that doesn't include rituals involving oil and water.

I'm also drawing on my Mediterranean heritage in order to become a formidable mother. My role model is the story (from the 70s) of the inspirational Okaasan who stormed into her newly employed son's company headquarters and took her protest up to to the top brass. She was aghast and furious to learn that her progeny would be forced into the barbarian practice of cleaning his own backside as the company lacked washlets.

I came across my kid's cords the other day when I was looking for something. The bit that is kept is the bit that falls off after a few days. Will resemble (and presumably taste like) beef jerky. My kid's ones are kept in a little plastic box with the kanji "寿" written on it. On the bottom of the box is a sticker from the hospital with the kid's birth details on it. Presumably the box is supplied by the hospital as my kids were born in different hospitals so the boxes are a little different. One seems to be made by a formula company as apart from the kanji "森永ドライミルク is written on it. The cord itself is in a small plastic bag and there's some silica gel in there too.

Yes, it is.
We Japanese keep just a little bit cord end only, which was attached to the baby -- typically 2 or 3cm, with a thread that is used for cramp.

So just the stump, and so very easy indeed. The only way you wouldn't end up with this item is if the baby needed to stay in the hospital long enough after birth that the stump had time enough to dry up and fall off, in which case the nursing staff would pitch it in the trash (unless you've asked them not to). ksandness' friend must have had a nice long recovery stay after her birth if the nurses were able to hand her the stump upon discharge from the hospital.