I’m no stranger to dolls who have sex. At the age of nine I was a Barbie doll fanatic.  I didn’t have all the accoutrements, like the Barbie camper and Barbie airplane, but Barbie still had it all: Ken.

My sister, 10 years my senior, made certain that I understood that Ken was by no means anatomically correct. At nine I didn’t know what “anatomical” meant, but I knew she meant that the bulbous area at Ken’s crotch was not how it looked on real men. It didn’t bother me, because it was Barbie who rubbed up against that area, not me.

Barbie and Ken would do it on the dollhouse couch made of two by fours and contact paper. The sounds of sex coming from these hard plastic dolls:  click clack, clickety clack.

Afterward, he’d sit on the sofa with his legs sticking straight out in front of him, reading a miniature newspaper, and she’d put on a sundress and high heels and begin dinner. My older sister should have also let me know that Ken was a chauvinist.

As an adult, I’m happy to say the doll manufacturing world has fixed that anatomical incorrectness. The stiff legs, the plastic pyramid breasts, the sock-shaped crotch, have all been revamped with silicone. She hasn’t just been given new breasts, botox or collagen injections; Barbie got a full-body implant. Of course, it’s not Mattel’s doing. I’m talking about Real Dolls by Abyss Creations. Their website says, “Our dolls feature completely articulated skeletons which allow for anatomically correct positioning, an exclusive blend of the best silicone rubbers for an ultra flesh-like feel, and each doll is custom made to your specifications.” No more clickity clack sex sounds. No more bogus genital areas! These dolls are full-fledged pseudo human beings.

Choices go beyond just Malibu Barbie, PJ, and Palm Beach Sugar Daddy Ken. You can choose between 50,000 options. Choices range from lip color, nail shape, pubic coif, magnet-based removable faces, and nipple size. There’s a flat-back doll that falls perfectly in position when dropped on your bed. Come up with a flawed mortal part, and Real Dolls will answer with a flawless immortal silicone replica. And Real Dolls aren’t just for men any more.  Two male dolls are available for purchase, and for an additional fee you can have a penis attached to a female doll to create a she-male. Something for everyone, or rather, for every relationship.

While it still might be a game — let’s pretend that you, the perfectly gorgeous woman of my dreams, wants to have sex with me, a lush who hasn’t brushed his teeth since 1979 — reality still reels its ugly head after the last post-coital snore. In addition to the clean up (Real Dolls come with a cleaning kit), just like every relationship there’s every day life on the other side of that initial stage of passion.

When I first started researching the Real Dolls, I wondered who would spend $6000 for a body that needs to be heated up with an electric blanket just so the “user” can avoid feeling like a necrophiliac. I assumed they’d be low-life sex addicts who objectified women, and some of them probably are. But I can’t help also picturing men who are terribly shy or awkward, who have tried and tried to find companionship, like the title character in “Lars and the Real Girl,” a must-see movie (and one that’s done a lot to shape mainstream perceptions of Real Dolls and their owners).

When I was a kid, I played with Barbie during the day, but at night I slept with a stuffed monkey named Pinky (not  an original moniker, but he never complained). He fit just right between my arms and just under my chin when I curled on my side. One night when I had a stomach virus, I threw up on him. My mom tossed Pinky in the washing machine, and after the spin cycle he never quite looked the same — his pink fur, now more of a silvery fuzz. But I loved him even more for not rejecting me after I puked on his head.

Perhaps the Pinky/Real Doll comparison can only go so far — Pinky had no orifices, while a Real Doll has a throat that is seven inches long. (With her gaping mouth, each doll looks like she’s gasping.) But while Real Dolls probably endure much of the same abuse Pinky did, and more, I see proof in the online catalog that these owners also love their Dolls even more after the spin cycle. For instance: the part of the Real Doll that wears out the fastest is the feet. The Dolls weigh close to 80 lbs, and since they don’t walk on their own (robotics have not been perfected yet, though the lab is at work on sensitizing the genital and nipple areas so the doll exerts an “ahhh” sound) there’s quite a bit of dragging around the house being done. So, new feet are required, and replacements are available. It’s like the carburetor of the little woman, some engineer’s idea of TLC.

In some ways,  Real Dolls and the Men Who Love Them (MWLT) have a perfect relationship. She’s there whenever he needs her, she’s always in the mood, and she never lets her figure go.  But the Real Doll can’t clean house, she can’t grocery shop, and she can’t entertain his mother. She can keep him company during just about all of the above, except maybe entertaining his mother.

Even at $6000 a pop, sales at Abyss Creations are strong. What does this say about the difficulty of finding someone who will just be with us?  Someone who we can be intimate with, who we can care about and feel safe with. Someone who we are happy to buy new feet for when hers get worn out from being dragged around.

While a Real Doll may not be able to laugh at your jokes, and may be generally lacking in the conversation department, when she does embarrass you, you can just stuff her in the closet. And if we are really honest with ourselves, who hasn’t sometimes wished they had a partner who would (maybe just for a short while) be quiet, disappear, look sexy, wear what you wanted them to, didn’t interrupt, didn’t criticize, and yet would always be there when you needed them to be?

Of course, we shouldn’t all switch from real humans to Real Dolls, but I can’t condemn the men who find a truer happiness for themselves because flesh and blood just wasn’t really their type. For the lonelyhearts with an extra $6000 dollars lying around, I hope that at least one can trade in the teddy bear he’s cried into, jacked off on, and slept with since he was 14 and find happiness with something just a little more adult. My advice, and this goes for all types of relationships: Just don’t wait until it’s too late to replace the feet.

Photo credit: come as you are cooperative and kankalas