Imagination? Or psychosis?

i say my dolls are my babies but i mean thats just wierd to think dolls are alive

 

Note: All below standing 'you's are meant general and in no way offensive to whoever is reading this.

I find this a rather interesting topic, seeing how I am currently working in a psychiatric nursing home. I'm aware that you mean psychosis more as a 'strong belief' that the doll is in fact a being on it's own, and this intrigues me.. because it actually asks us that when the lines between childhood and puberty dissolve and you remain believing that mister cuddles is in fact a guardian of you at night and misses teacup loves her new dress so much she just wants to hug you and love you.. when does it go too far?

The actual belief (ie. acting along with the doll and it taking a part in your head where you consider it alike to a human being) of the doll being a sole being, is in my opinion where it's starting to look like a serious psychiatric condition. Of course, this can be due to several factors as loneliness, need for someone to talk to or just a certain mishap in your brains. However, it should be looked at in a serious manner, because things could take a turn for the worst. Believing your doll to be a live being could easily take a turn for the worst. The brain is made up to try and make sense of everything. This can be explained by the simple Ganzfeld experiment where psychologists try to 'trick the brain' with great success. It consists of putting on some white noise (static on the radio will do just fine) and taping the halves of a pingpong ball over your eyes. Laying down and listening to the noise, participants in the experiment experienced strange happenings such as hearing deceased relatives or seeing marvelous hallucinations of utopias. In short, the brain tries to make sense of the whole situation and makes you believe another sort of reality. This could easily happen when having the strong, no, overtaking belief that your doll (or any other inanimate object) is alive.. because things that are alive make noise, right? And they move, right? You can see for yourself what's happening here.

Of course, there are varying degrees in believing your doll is real. The forementioned theory is a quite extreme, but possible one. Maybe you like to see your dolls/plushies as things with an entity, in a way you learn to treat them respectfully (keeping in mind they cost a lot of money). Maybe you simply adore them for their looks and maybe even envy them, but don't consider them alive. Maybe you're just an insane collector who enjoys being in the company of a lot of dolls that are beautiful and expensive (hey, big deal!). And maybe you just like to see one of your fragments of imagination in reality (ie. giving dolls characters and such).

So in my opinion, handling a doll with care and love isn't too bad. Of course, we bond with them. But all in a playfull manner. However, when things start changing and you actually start taking in notion whether 'he' is okay with your actions and decisions.. then it might be a good idea to go talk with someone.

 

I think we are all just talking about at most secondary psychosis, not full blown psychosis. Secondary psychosis encompasses religious visions and things that don't actually interfere with normal functioning, as far as I understand it. Many people firmly believe that inanimate objects have feelings/souls/etc... for some this is a spiritual belief, for others not, but this isn't definitely psychosis until the inanimate object starts to demand attention, issue instructions, literallly interact with the person who has this belief surely?

I think many people melodramatically claim that their dolls are "real" to them but deep down they do understand the difference between reality and fantasy, they are just choosing to indulge in the fantasy more than most. As long as they understand that distinction, there is no problem. Dolls look human and we project personalities onto them and create companions for ourselves, they are simulations of real people.

As long as they remain our creation those simulations seem healthy to me, we all practice conversations and social interactions with simulated "people" in our heads - how often have you run through a potentially heated situation in your mind before it actually happens? Like when you forgot to do an assignment at school and you rehearse all the scenarios in your mind before "The dog ate my homework" splutters out of your mouth in front of the whole class? We have simulated versions of our classmates, teacher, parents... everyone who might come into that situation, in our heads and we put words in their mouths so that we can figure out our best tactic.

For some of us a doll has become a physical manifestation of one of those simulated personalities that we can interact with. We might imagine them saying things but as long as they are not speaking words we didn't put in their mouths, then we are just imaginative. And, as many have already said, when the line is crossed, being into dolls has no direct link with the psychosis, it's just that psychosis has manifested itself in that form because the person affected is interested in dolls.

 

Actually the point at which imagination or any other mental process is diagnosed as a disorder is the point at which it affects their day-to-day functioning. Examples: If someone with OCD gets a technical writing job and therefore works alone on the same repetitive tasks all day, they're happy. It works for them and all is well, but if that same person worked as a social worker they would have constant interactions with people and situations that they can't control, it would affect the stress level of the individual. At that point it would be a disorder.

So applying that to our topic, if your beliefs about your dolls affect your interactions with family and friends in a negative manner then it may be something that deserves some consideration.

 

This is so true! I went to see Toystory 3 last Sunday, and spent half the movie feeling guilty for all those stuffed animals and dolls I've put in a box and more or less forgot all about. I used to actually BELIEVE my toys were alive when I was young. This was long before Toystory came out, and was not because of my overzealous imagination, but because my mom, who is just as young of heart as I am now :P, used to sneak up into my room and played with some of the toys, putting them in different positions than the ones I left them in.
I still talk to dolls as if they were alive. I know that they are not, but I don't care, really, as long as no one is around to think me loopy

 

My first doll is being shipped soon, so I'm unsure exactly where even I stand on this subject, but I know I have an idea.

Sometimes I believe that it's not a matter of 'souls' but rather energy. I'm not talking about electricity, but rather auras. Ever go back through old toys and still feel attached, even though you'll never play with it again? Or you feel partial to a particular necklace because your late grandmother gave it to you, even though you don't really like it that much?
I feel that in a way, it's the same thing. These dolls can look so human and once you add a character and story to them, they seem even more like little people. You can easily feel the energy or aura of your doll because you put so much effort, money and artistic talent into them. And in the end, the aura turns your doll into a small person.
Though yes, just as you can think, 'I remember playing with this toy, but I know I don't really need it anymore,' or, 'Sorry Grandma, I just don't like this necklace,' we are also capable of knowing that our dolls are not truly alive.

 

Inanimate objects dont have souls. However, what they do have is the energy you give them. The more love and effort you give them that thing you give them becomes a part of them and that is the way they live. Of course trying to get them more comfortable and stuff is fine. You're not crazy. As someone said before theres a difference between pretending and believing. Theres also wishing (which is close to pretending).

If you really think your doll has a soul, its not a soul per say... more like the spirit and aura you gave him/her...

they live through you.

Thats my belief anyway.

 

The only differance between an imaginary friend and a doll is that a doll has physical mass.

 

For me it's when you start to believe they are capable of sentience or exerting a will of their own.

 

kinda sounds like horcruxes????

 

This really is a sensitive topic to discuss.......... for me I create dolls' personalities and often change it up to what I feel like them to be as they can turn out different character when I change their wig or eyes, that's what I call imagination.

But once you turn your back from reality and other living people and lock yourself talking only to the dolls that's when I call it phychosis.

 

well said!

 

You are asking is there a line. In imagination? I don't think imagination can/should/is able to be in some kind of a "norm". The words don't even look ok in the same sentence.
But then, I see people writing "this is Joe, I wanted to take pictures of him in the morning but he said he wasn't feeling like doing it" about a doll.
Does that creep me out? No. It surprises me a bit, that's all.
Everybody can look up the definition of the word "play". The dolls are toys, after all, so those people just play that their dolls are alive, it's absolutely ok, imho.

 

Honestly, I don't think that there is much harm (except in very, very rare cases) in believing such as long as it's not self-destructive. I mean, it's therapy.

That is perhaps the most philosophical one-liner reply to any thread-header question I have ever read. I'll probably quote this frequently.

 

I honestly can say that my girl has moved on her own and her expression has changed. Seeing things from a paranormal light it is not unheard of for a spirit to possess an inanimate object such as a bjd.

 

Now, where do you draw the line between imagination and psychosis?

I would say the first criterion that can be used when drawing the line between the two is control. If a person decides that they believe into doll souls, just like one decides to believe in God, or the Law, or Science, or anything else, they are in control of what they are doing. If the doll decides that they have to believe into its soul, and they have no chance of objection, then they are not in control anymore.

Imagining something, or believing in something in a religious or metaphysical way, doll souls and dolls being alive included, is a willful act. Psychosis - here discussed as a symptom, not a whole disorder -isn't.

There is a somewhat grey area when it comes to "supernatural" perceptions. For example when a person hears a doll's voice in their head unexpectedly, when they are not playing with the doll or even seeing it. Though usually, even the people who believe in the doll being alive are aware that the doll cannot speak physically and thus are able to distinguish the perceived as not real. Pseudohallucinations like that can occur in people without psychosis easily under certain circumstances.

So the second criterion used when drawing the line would be: ability to distinguish between real (as in "existing in the outside world") and unreal (as in "produced by one's own mind only") phenomena.

 

My girl's voice sometimes pops up in my head, sometimes she has short conversations with her brother (who is yet to come), and I pretty much take it as a continuation of a childish play-pretend games. I mean, when I was seven years old and saying "Mr. Bunny wanna have candy", it wasn't considered weird that I've believe Mr. Bunny wanted some candy. Why would it be weird for me to say "Belka wanted another sweater" now? I don't believe that you have to get rid of all of your childhood t go on.

Plus, now with me being more "grownup" and aware, I do realise that in this way, I just transfer excessive traits onto my doll - I can't be a spoiled kid, but she can. I do realise I'm playing pretend - and it doesn't really make it any less fun =)

 

People keep saying there's this huge difference between believing your doll is real with real feelings and emotions and knowing you're just making it all up, but really I think the line is thin and blurred.

For example, I'll frequently say things like "Tovi is mad that I haven't taken him out in awhile, so I'm taking him with me to the mall," or the like. His personality largely came from him. He was going to be a character in a story I wrote, but that story got lost when the computer it was on crashed and he hadn't even been introduced in it yet. When I got the doll, his character was very sketchy, but the more I played with him, the more personality he developed. So I may say "Tovi is being stubborn," when he 'refuses' to hold a pose that I've done countless times before and I know is well within his range of motion, but at the same time it isn't like I think he's going to come to life and kill me in my sleep. He can be stubborn and inanimate at the same time. I believe my boys have feelings, they just can't act on them because they're inanimate objects. But I try to take their feelings and personalities into consideration when I take them out for photos. I wouldn't make them do anything that they'd be uncomfortable with, because while they can't physically strike out, they can refuse to hold a pose for me if they're annoyed with me for some reason. So I believe that someone like me isn't crazy, but is probably straddling the line a bit. Still, I think it falls under nothing more drastic than an overactive imagination, and there's nothing wrong with that.

 

vonbonbon--most brilliant response ever!

 

Well put! My stand exactly!