Overprotective of your dolls?

I know that I would be overprotective as heck once I own a dolly. The thought of accidentally dropping the doll just hurts my heart, and I usually don't like it when people touch my objects in the first place. Especially if I spent a lot of money on them!

I went to a festival recently, and I was surprised to even get the chance to hold a BJD. Usually, I feel a lot of owners are a bit picky about who gets to hold their dolls, but I was very blessed to be able to hold this gorgeous girly.

 

Blimey I feel like a bad owner I am not very protective at all as I like to handle and enjoy my dolls none of mine are in a box all out on display. The only thing I do have is a stand for some that don't stand too well on their own.
As my hands are so bad I have …..GASP!....dropped a doll but all was well and she forgave me.
I would if I managed to get to a meet be extra careful transporting them.
But I think you have to enjoy your hobby as you want to that's the joy of it its your hobby to do as you want.

Just like to say though If I do get to a meet I would be worried to hold others dolls if asked in case I dropped them.

 

Not at all - not everyone is overprotective. Its a very personal thing - to me they ae playthings so it defeats the purpose of having them if they aren't played with. Others seem to regard tem ore as ornaments that get set up and looked at but not touched, and there's a LOT of ground in between the two extemes.

Teddy

 

lol that was a joke or suppose to be .. I am like you I could not get a doll and never have it out on display to be enjoyed. but I know some people who collect them and other items go the other way. I have know people in the model horses even display them in the box. I find it fascinating how every treats the hobby different

 

i'm not very protective of my dolls, they have always sat atop my sewing machine at the mercy of my cat lol. can't tell you how many times i've had a fall.
to me there's no point in having something if the only thing i'm going to do with it is put in a box and take it out every once and a while. i can enjoy my dolls a lot better if i don't worry about any potential damages - an ear breaks off? i can fix it. the faceup gets scratched? i'll just redo it. yellowing? not even worth worrying about, it's plastic, it happens. i don't think it's bad to be protective of your dolls though, they can be pretty expensive and in some cases, hard to replace.
no matter how protective you are or aren't of your dolls, i think the most important thing is that you're still able to enjoy them.

 

Once I realized they are not that fragile, I did stop with the overprotectiveness. I often take them out for photoshoots, but always put them away in their bags once they are not posing for the photos. Once Fraewion (a Snowborn doll with the long, thin nose) fell to his face and I was terrified if his nose was broken :O But only a piece of blushing came off

I only feel uncomfortable when people with sweaty hands touch them... my boyfriend has very sweaty hands so I always tell him to touch them by their clothes

 

I think you hit the nail on the head with this. I've been to several meets and seen the extremes and lots of middle ground. Most people have similar rules to taking a picture of a cosplayer. You can often handle their doll if you ask nicely first. My self I am protective when moving them and pack them snug and tight with lots of padding and blankets. But two of mine have taken clunkers. One fell during a meet from the table onto the floor. He did have a break, but thankfully it was just an internal part of his head cap that was easily glued and is never visible.
I guess since I've had the worst happen I may be a bit more lax. I handle my dolls like fragile toys. Very carefully playing with them whenever I get the chance.

 

i mostly worry about strangers touching them. i know they're not glass but whenever someone else handles them--99.9999999% of the time someone who has not encountered bjds and doesnt understand how much ive shelled out for them lol--the dolls almost ALWAYS get handled kinda roughly. not so badly that they risk immediate damage, or that i feel compelled to snatch them back, buuuut i wont take my eyes off of someone handling my dolls ^^' i only pull out one at a time for this reason too. trying to advise people not to touch the faceup is the worst part imo, you can just see when someone isnt listening.

the one thing i really think i couldnt do is hand a doll to a young child. some kids are respectful of others' things and im sure would handle my doll fine, but if i dont know that beforehand then im going to assume not lol. given the lack of respect they get from adults, why would i assume a kid knew any different??

all that being said, i am not the most delicate with them myself lol. theres been a few, uh, mishaps, which i just brush off, and aside from sunlight i dont worry about too much. i think its just different when i fuck something up on my own doll vs when someone else is careless. i would never ever ever handle someone else's doll with anything but the utmost care.

 

I'd considered myself over-protective but reading this has been really interesting, I especially like the idea from several posts about 'this cost so much money, why am I hiding it in a box instead of enjoying it?'
My boyfriend can be a little heavy-handed but he's aware of this and gives my dolls a wide berth, and my girlfriend knows how to handle them so I trust her. The only accident so far has been my Dad opening a cabinet in my room and knocking my Resinsoul Ming (Carlisle) off my desk onto a wooden floor. The little guy had curled up like a beetle but luckily had nothing damaged! I've learned I can afford to be a little less strict about how I handle them now

 

I take my dolls everywhere....work, doctors appointments, lunch, etc

So far, no damages or problems have occurred while taking them out...the only thing that has happened was inside my house while she sat where I keep her

Sure, they're expensive and special, but what's the point of spending $100+ on something you are never going to do anything with?

 

Mine are definitely overprotected. They aren't in the box, but they live in a cabinet and I don't take them outside or in the sun much at all. I think I'm paranoid mainly because they're mostly brown-skinned and I'm afraid they'll "yellow" into an unnatural shade like green...

 

Some of mine are more protected than others, but nothing has ever befallen them. Then again, they don't go out and they are kept in a low-lit room that only sees direct sunlight for a couple of hours each morning [the dolls are on a bookshelf, away from the path of the light, but they're not shrouded in blackness all day]. I would go to a doll-meet one day if my social anxieties would allow me... It's not even anxiety based on the dolls' safety, it's my only silly little insecurities.

As for my original statement [that some are more protected than others], my vinyl doll has been given something of a 'sleeping bag', you could call it, that is lined in white. It's a glorified dust cover, because I've read vinyl stains easier than resin, and I'm just making sure he stays as clean as possible. Plus, I can take him out and about with fewer anxieties about his condition. I just need a doll-meet I can attend...

 

I keep him in his box, but never wear gloves when I play with him. I am not really overprotective, but I never let my mother to dress him. She is not really sensitive with him, and I just don't like when she treat my doll, as a young child playing with a Barbie doll.

 

I handle my gang pretty carefully... I'm not rough with them and I'm careful about light exposure long-term... But there's no way I'm going to keep them boxed up, handle them with gloves or be overly paranoid about taking them outside. The way I look at it, I didn't spend a small fortune on this collection of mine just to pack them away.

I didn't buy them as some kind of investment.
I didn't buy them for posterity.

I bought them to tinker around with and enjoy here and now.

If that means they won't be "Mint in Box" forever, so be it. I value them very highly, yes... But I absolutely refuse to be so precious about them that I let it get in the way of their purpose.

(And, for what it's worth, I've been known to hand my dolls over to other people pretty freely. I trust most other collectors to handle them reasonably, and just give "civilians" a warning about not touching the face when I hand them off. I've also lent them to friends... My Puck spent the whole month of December at a neighbor's house, playing "Elf on the Shelf" for her two young daughters. He came to absolutely no harm, and the girls had a great time with him.)

 

since she will be my first ever BJD i am going to be super overprotective. I am also so weary of my BF's son. for one time when left all alone he took several of my Monster High Dolls, and undressed them and messed up their hair, i was very pissed off but he did end up replacing a few well i mean his dad made him, and since he is still growing and getting more curious i am slightly afraid he will be lame enough and take my BJD , but i do have a security camera now so i can capture him. i would love to take the doll out and get some great photo ops like i've seen so many others do with there doll, but i don't know, maybe after i've kept her safe and admired her a bit i will be more likely to take her on adventures.

 

It sounds like it's bothering you not to do more with them. What if you pick one and do something you really want to do, and pay close attention to how it goes?

I mean, your own feelings and everything. If it's really hard, maybe it's just a matter of, take your doll and pose them or admire them for a few minutes, then take them down and put them safely up, and check how you feel. Take it easy and give yourself a treat afterward, this hobby is supposed to be fun!

 

For my doll, not at all. I pick her up, move her about and play around with her all the time. She hasn't spent a single moment in her box. I'm not worried about yellowing at all, and I know she is made of resin, so it's pretty sturdy.

My mindset is, if I spent this much on a doll, then I get to play with it to get my money worth. lol I definitely don't wear gloves, since it's my stuff and I don't need to wear gloves touching stuff that's mine.

However, I recently got a really nice handmade wig for her, and I'm way more protective of the wig than my doll....It's mainly because I ruined two wigs already, and this one is super nice...I don't want to ruin it or have it styling to get messy
When she is wearing this wig, I move her about less, and I only have her to wear this wig infrequently..

 

Personally, photographing my dolls is one of the reasons I have dolls, so I’ve been known to throw one down into a patch of ivy or tangle them in a tree for a good nature shot and then it’s like, “Whoops, let me get those leaves out of your hair!” I do handle them with their fragility in mind, but I don’t think it makes sense to own them if I’m afraid to ever touch them. (I think I’ve gotten less overprotective since I started painting them myself too, because if something crazy went wrong and a faceup was damaged I could just redo it.)

That said, I’ve had dolls (plural) damaged by other people when I was too trusting at meetups, so I am that owner who makes sure I’m watching when they’re handled by other people.

 

In order to take pictures of my dolls, I like to take them to the park. In my room, I always put them in the drawer, though they are just toys for me.

 

All my dolls are in cabinets behind glass doors except the big ones (because I don't have a cabinet that's big enough).
I'm not that protective - but I am careful with horns, tails, etc. and paranoid about losing them.