Creepy Lifelike Dolls Help Owners Grieve

Madeline Holler — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 13:31:00 GMT

OK, now I feel bad. Yesterday, I called adults who play with these lifelike "Reborn" dolls crazy. But now I'm reading they have helped many people -- including parents who suffered the loss of a child -- to grieve.

In fact, some people add on all kinds of stuff to enhance the "cuddle therapy." They even fit the dolls with a mechanism that mimics a heartbeat and breathing. (I'm still soooo uncomfortable here.)

From Reuters:

"I pick them up and I change them and I do hold them like a baby now and again -- it's relaxing," said doll-owner Gill, a 50-year-old grandmother who asked to remain anonymous because of the way reborning has been portrayed in the media.

Cathy Newcombe, who makes the dolls and runs reborning Website Reborn Babies UK, said counsellors were increasingly looking into the therapeutic benefits of holding reborn babies.

"The act of holding the doll may have a role in releasing a 'feel-good' hormone," Newcombe said.

The woman who started "Reborn" dolls didn't have therapy in mind when she created the first one. She just wanted to get her daughter off her back.

"My daughter wanted a sibling and I didn't want to have any more children, so I made her a doll instead," said the 32-year-old mother of two.

Still, dolls, "Reborn" or not, are showing promising uses for grieving parents and, in some instances, people suffering Alzheimer's.

Fine, it's a good thing. What do you think? Medical breakthrough or still a bit creepy?

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Photo: goearth.wordpress.com

'Reborn' Dolls Freaking Out Cops, Among Others (Myself Included)

Madeline Holler — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 18:03:00 GMT

Australian police smashed through the window of a parked car in an heroic attempt to rescue a baby that had been left in the backseat to swelter in the sun.

Only, whoops! That baby was a doll, one of the expensive, collectible, handmade and very lifelike "Reborn" dolls that some folks have found themselves becoming incredibly attached too. (Diagnosis: crazy!)

How could one mistake a doll for the real thing? Well, see that picture up there to the right?

Yep, those are two "Reborn" dolls. Here's what their "Mommy," Vynette Cernik has to say about her babies, which sell for $1,000 a piece and have eyelashes, fingernails, milk spots and wispy hair.

From Australia's Herald Sun:

"They're even weighted to feel like a baby's weight, and they flop like a baby," Ms Cernik said.

Some dolls even come with an umbilical cord and their own birth certificate.

"They are so realistic, people do become attached to them," Ms Cernik said.

"You don't stop playing with dolls because you grow old. You grow old because you stop playing with dolls.

Or not.

In any case, Cernik is recommending doll owners put a sticker in the car window if they plan to leave a Reborn doll unattended while they run into the store for more formula and diapers.

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