Separation Anxiety: When you just can't let go...

Well, I haven't really even got as far as selling them....( I felt I had too many dolls, but just accept that fact now)

 

I can't let any of my dolls go either. I got problems with my dollzone cherry, bonding doesn't go very well. Same with my dollzone coney, she is just way to small for me, I am really an SD-type of person. But the idea of selling one of them (or both) does make me regret it. So I just can't sell any of my dolls, I would miss them way too much.

 

I've never sold one and have no plans to--so yeah, I can't let my dolls go, lol.

 

I once took Moth to a meet and had the host give her a face-up. It was getting late and he suggested that I leave her there and he could send her home to me once he was done. I hadn't owned Moth for very long, at the time, and didn't even realize how bonded I was to her. I literally had an anxiety attack at the thought of having to leave her for any amount of time. So I stayed a little later then I should have, just to make sure I didn't have to leave her.


So yes, I have separation anxiety at the thought of leaving my dolls somewhere that I have no control over when I get them back or when I can see them again.

 

I was wondering the other day, that if DollGa released an upgrade to either their female body, or an upgrade to the Noella head, I just wouldn't be able to upgrade/swap/re-buy my girl. Sappy as it sounds, it just wouldn't be her. If she ended up on a different body which moved in different ways, I would feel like her character had changed and she wouldn't be the same!

 

Yes and it can get very bad. If I am going somewhere and I am spending the night one of my dolls (usually Issac) has to come with me. No exceptions. I hate sleeping anywhere that is not my bed so having him there helps a lot.

Also I left Isabelle at friend's house for a week to get a face up. It was the longest week of my life. Then I made my sister drive through a snow storm to pick her up. I was so happy to get her back.

 

Actually, I'm glad to say I HAVEN'T felt like that.

I've gotten rid of 3 or 4 of my dolls, and I really didn't have any regret in doing so. I'm one of the few people on the forum whose dolls are 'just dolls'. I hate to make it sound so bad, but that is what they are to me. They are expensive collectables.

I still think of the girls I sold, from time to time, and wonder how they are doing, but I know that them going to someone else was probably the best thing for them.

 

I completely understand this issue with Separation anxiety. I spend so much of my time just looking at my doll as she sits in my room, and if I end up staying somewhere else for a while then I really miss just being able to look at her face.

For Christmas this year I went to my boyfriends house and stayed with his family for a couple of days, and I missed her desperately. It almost made me want to go home. Now I know this is extreme, and I don't even really understand it myself. The whole time I was at my bf's I was thinking, "what's wrong with me? She is just a doll."

She kind of makes me feel like a kid again the way I have become attached to her. I treat her like she has feelings and thoughts and I want to bring her around with me. Sometimes it makes me feel silly or immature when I think about how much it reminds me of how I played as a child.

I haven't walked around with her in public or anything, but when I leave my dorm to visit home I bring her, and I wouldn't dream of leaving her at home while I am living in my dorm.

Sometimes I almost feel like I am turning antisocial because I like to spend so much time looking up info about the dolls (I've had my doll for a little over 2 months and am still in the process of learning everything) and how I couldn't wait to go home to see her when I was visiting my boyfriend and his family for Christmas.

Soooo yeah, I definitely get the whole separation anxiety thing...

 

When I went on holiday with my boyfriend last summer I was desperate to see my dolls again. After being with them in my room constantly, I missed their presence and it felt strange enough to be sleeping in a different bed and travelling around a different city without having the familiar faces of my dolls around me!

 

Well when I was just five years old, an evil relative of mine (my aunt who happens to be the black sheep of the family) ripped my Raggedy Ann doll right from my arms and threw her into the garbage can in front of everyone in front of a store after only having her for a week. I later found out that she was jealous that another relative gave a gift to me and not to her kids! I remember clearly not doing anything wrong and couldn't understand why she would do something so drastic for no good reason. I think that terrible, dramatic episode traumatized me and ever since, I've had some difficulty giving up dolls, even stuffed animals too for that matter! I can bag the stuffed ones and store them away but tossing them out or giving them away has always been such a challenge for me! As far as giving up/selling a BJD, I just don't see that happening, at least not very easily! I think the only separation I can handle and be O.K. with it is when I send a mold away to get a face-up but that's only because I know it'll come back to me new and improved

 

I don't see myself being able to part with any of my dolls, but I also know that most of my attachment to them comes from the amount of work I've put into them. Doing their faceups, wigs, restringing, it's all an investment of time and effort (and money, too), and when I do that kind of work I have a hard time parting with it. (I'm similar with my artwork; I had one sculpture of a series stolen/destroyed once, and could never quite finish the rest of it because of the loss of that one piece. I had another sculpture irreparably damaged during firing, and while I remade it I never got rid of the broken original.)

 

The only dolls I have ever sold have been dolls that I bought on impulse because they were cheap. I never really bonded with any of them. However the dolls that I carefully picked out after looking at hundreds, I would never sell. Even when they come out with super poseable new bodies and such, I have no desire to switch out. I like them exactly the way they are.

 

Pregnant or not, when you create a bond with anything it makes it difficult to let it go. It doesn't matter if it's a doll, an old family heirloom, or whatever! You have an obvious connection with your 1st Freya and sending her away indefinately isn't an option. It's not just thinking that the next person won't care for her the same way you did it's more the fact that no longer having her in your home has put some hole in your life, however small.
Yes, it's very nice that your husband is so supportive, I, for one, am very glad to hear it. Keep your Freya and get her sister as well.

 

I bought a damaged head when i first started this hobby. I was sort of inclined to make her into a character of mine. But I wasn't convinced her mold was mature enough.

She sat in my work bench for months, the victim of several new mods and face-up experiments. The first time I gave her a gore face-up I decided that she would be okay for my character. When I gave her the "character" face-up, I just fell in love with her. My $35 practice head was perfect and wonderful to me.

I have tried several times to look for a more suitable and mature mold for my girl, but I just CAN'T bring myself to replace her now.

 

I have no issues with lending my kids to a friend when she asks (I know they'll come home with a ton of new gifts when I do that) but if my friends keeps them for longer than about a week, I start to bug her about when she'll be giving my child back. The empty space where the away-from-home doll would go just looks odd.

I'm not sure I could ever sell them, though... I love all of my kids far too much!

 

I'm a Freya/Sky owner too (technically sky since that's how "he" was sold to me, but I've turned it to a she), and I felt the same way when I saw the Type 2 version of her--though it wasn't anywhere near the point of anxiety I guess. Sure, the new version may look a little better--but I like Tanya just the way she is, and she's stayin' dangit. I'll never let her go.

But I was still capable of selling off a couple dolls when they didn't fit well with their character as I hoped. Though I remember feeling really sad when I drove away from the post office after dropping off a package with my first doll, which I didn't bond.

 

I have sold a decent number of dolls now, but I do not regret doing so because I know that the doll is going to a new home where they will be loved. I always sell to DOA members and often see the doll posted on the forums again after they have gone. It's nice to see them well-loved. You never know whether you will bond or not.