There are baby dolls that you can purchase that you really bottlefeed and that really wet their diapers. While, I see nothing wrong with allowing our children to use their imaginations and “pretend” like their dolls are drinking and eating, I also understand how utterly cool these dolls are in the eyes of little girls.
Realistic Dolls Don’t Promote Breastfeeding
I also recognize that since little girls can’t lactate, in order to use these “life like dolls” a little girl has to bottle feed her baby. I don’t really like that. Pretend play is very important in molding who our children become as adults, so I’ d like to put on record that I really, really, really wish that people wouldn’t pre-design our little girls to grow
up to be bottle feeders. If our daughters grow up to be bottle-feeders, they will be at a higher risk of developing breast, uterine, ovarian and cervical cancer. This may not seem like a big deal now, while they’re tiny perfect little girls. Fast forward thirty years though, when this little girl is now your best friend, your shopping buddy, and the person you talk to every day on the phone. This woman is the mother of your grandchildren. Now tell me that her risks of breast, uterine, cervical and ovarian cancer are not a big deal. I could go on endlessly about the reasons we should help our daughters be OK with breastfeeding, but most of us already know the benefits that your future adult daughter breastfeeding your grandchildren will deliver.
Realistic Dolls Come with Disposable Diapers
I also don’t like the idea of wasting disposable baby doll diapers. From the doll maker’s perspective, these are awesome. They promise repeat business. Not only do they win the purchase of the initial doll, they also win the purchase of hundreds of disposable diapers for these dolls. This is such irresponsible consumerism; it’s actually repulsive to me. I understand disposable diapering an actual baby. I don’t like the waste. I think that if people actually tried cloth diapers, they would find that it’s easy, fun and makes you feel good, but I do “get” disposable diapering an actual baby. There is nothing in the world that can make me understand or accept disposable diapering a doll though. This “playing” leaves our daughters with the legacy of even more pointless garbage to deal with when her generation is in authority. This “playing” wastes our resources. This “playing” encourages waste, for absolutely NO REASON. A bag or two of disposable toy diapers may not seem like a lot when it’s just your daughter creating it in the whole grand scheme of garbage. However, if they’re mass producing these toy diapers, that means that we are mass disposing of these diapers. You see? Thankfully, there are other options. For example, Happy Heinys makes reusable cloth diapers for dolls. Sure, they’re fifteen dollars for a pack of three. The thing is though, the disposable doll diapers are ten dollars for a pack of six! A pack of six diapers will last a little girl, maybe a day. Reusable cloth baby doll diapers will last your daughter a lifetime.
“It’s just playing!”
It may seem like this is all pointless. It may seem like I’m making a big deal over nothing. Playing is not just playing. Playing shapes children’s mindsets. We have the opportunity to raise conscientious, responsible adults. How we sculpt their playing as little ones matters. Even if you don’t believe this though, if you facilitate this kind of playing in your child, think of how you’re going to explain to your future adult daughter facing a waste crisis of epic proportions with her entire generation that you bought her disposable diapers for her doll. If you provide these “bottle feeding” dolls to your child, think of how you’re going to comfort your future adult daughter, when breastfeeding is more commonplace and she doesn’t find it comfortable.
What do you think? Can you justify the ridiculousness of these realistic dolls and their disposable accessories? Do you agree? I’d love to hear your opinions.
When I was young and got my first cabbage patch doll I was beyond excited. I wasn’t a typical doll playing girl, so I’m not entirely sure why I was so excited. But I was. And I desperately wanted to change her diaper. The doll came with two diapers, one on her and one extra. My mom told me that I couldn’t change the diaper unless it ripped. I ripped it myself and changed the diaper. Then ripped the backup and asked for more. My mom refused to buy me more. So my cabbage patch doll became potty trained instantly. LOL
My mom “got it.” Why spend money on disposable diapers for a DOLL???? They serve no real purpose. Girls can play with dolls and change diapers without having to throw anything away. Isn’t that was our imagination is for??????
Dawn,
I thought you would appreciate this: My daughter (in the picture) does have bottles for her dolls and uses them like many little girls do. The funny thing is that I do not have another child to breastfeed in front of her but she has occasionally seen or heard of friends or family doing so. She does crack me up on many occasions, though, as she walks around the house with a baby held to her chest, saying, ” I am feeding her with my nipple.” 🙂 My husband is very much a guy about it and thinks its weird for her to say that but I think its great that she understands it. I am also glad she will understand what is happening when I finally DO have another baby to feed in front of her.
My daughter has a Baby Alive that she loves and we just use cloth diapers on it! The HH doll diapers don’t absorb and I wanted something easy that my daughter can put on the doll herself, so I got her a couple of the HH micro mini AIOs. They’re great! I also use the Baby Alive as an example of how easy cloth diapering can be when I talk to parenst who have doubts- even my 3 year old can do it! 🙂
The bottles don’t bother me at all. Formula isn’t evil and plenty of moms pump and feed breastmilk to their babies in bottles. In fact, the majority of the breastmilk my daughter consumed was fed to her in bottles. Just because a product isn’t pro-breastfeeding doesn’t necessarily make it anti-breastfeeding.
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I’ve been thinking about this recently, because of some conversations we’ve had with my three-year-old son. In anticipation of our baby-to-be, we’ve been reading books about new babies with him. Anytime he sees a crying baby in a picture, he says we need to put “one of those things” in its mouth. He doesn’t even know what it’s called, but he’s seen all his baby dolls come with a pacifier. It’s interesting to me, not because I’m anti-pacifier though we never used one with him, but just to see how much influence these dolls have on his perception of what’s appropriate for a baby.
Ours didn’t come with diapers, so I’ve been wanting to make some cloth ones!
I had a doll who wet when I was a little girl and I LOVED her. My mom cloth diapered us, so she also made this dolly cloth diapers (no covers though, so she had to be changed QUICK). I don’t think giving her a bottle made me think breastfeeding wasn’t the choice for me when I became pregnant with my first child. What made me stop breastfeeding him at 6 months was a ignorant pediatrician who I trusted because of her credentials. Due to food allergy issues with my second I had to stop nursing at 9 months and pumped/milk share until 13 months. With my third she is simply self-weaning (currently 10.5 mos) and there is very little I can do about that. So they have all 3 had bottles. I’m not a bad mom. I don’t think giving a play doll a baby bottle will make them not breastfeed in the future. I think breastfeeding in front of them, and being around other moms who are also breastfeeding will have a far bigger impact on their choices then a baby doll that they’ll outgrow in a couple of years. Hoping if we have a baby #4 that we’ll get to 12 months and beyond…despite the fact that my doll had a bottle :o)
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I used to play with flat diapers on my dolls when I was little because my mom used them on me. I think the baby alive dolls are creepy but that is just my opinion. I love the picture by the way!