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Posts: 6I've been sort of "in the closet" with my teddy bear obsession. I've loved stuffed animals since I was little and I guess I never outgrew it. But now my tastes run towards teddy bears specifically. I am just sooo embarrassed to admit it. But I guess there are worse things to be guilty of in life than having a... a "few" >_>... teddy bears.
What I find so interesting (and it doesn't make me feel so bad!) is how many posts/threads I've read here about someone who lost their bear and wants to replace it. I actually created an account here to ask that very question, but I don't even have a photo of the bear in question. It wasn't even old or vintage, just about 4-6" tall and lime green with white accents. But it was at least old enough to be better made than the really flimsy falling-apart-at-the-seams-already things that are sold as "new" these days in most convenience or gift stores. And I say that because I am pretty sure that this lime green guy came from a gift shop or flower shop. I have tried for years now to replace it and for the life of me - I can't even find a sign that it ever even existed! But I don't expect any answers - I am sort of beyond expecting the possibility of a replacement now. I don't believe it's going to happen and I certainly can't count on it, so I just enjoy the teddy bears I still have. :-)
PennsylvaniaThere is nothing wrong with adults collecting Teddy Bears.
Teddy Bears are one of the top five most collected items. Right up there with stamps, coins, dolls and model trains.
My wife and I have over 1,000 Teddy Bears in our collection. No! That's not a joke! That's a "one" with a comma and three "zeroes." We have a bedroom in our house that has been specially redecorated to be our Teddy Bear Lodge.
Teddy Bear collecting is a fine hobby. There is a lot of history involved.
Of course, we know that the name "Teddy's Bear" was coined by Morris Michtom, the founder of the Ideal Toy and Novelty Company, in 1902 after he saw Clifford Berryman's famous political cartoon "Drawing the Line in Mississippi" in the Washington Post. Did you also know that Theodore Roosevelt is believed to have use a Teddy Bear as his mascot in his campaign for reelection? Further, did you know that the song "Teddy Bear's Picnic" was used buy BBC broadcast engineers, for several years, as the official test recording for testing and calibrating radio transmission and studio equipment?
There is a lot of history and knowledge of manufacturers and products for Teddy Bear collectors to learn, understand and relate to the general public! Sentiment and caring are an important part of Teddy Bear collecting but Teddy Bears are not just children's playthings. There is more to it than that.
If you are a serious collector, some of your Bears can be quite valuable! The Guinness World Record for most expensive vintage, collectible Teddy Bear is £110,000!
http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/rec … ue-origin/
A Steiff bear named Teddy Girl was sold for £110,000 ($171,600), more than 18 times the estimate and twice the previous world record, by Christie's, London, UK on 5 December 1994 to Japanese businessman Yoshihiro Sekiguchi.
The bear was made in 1905, only a year after Steiff made he first jointed plush teddy bear, and had a particularly well-documented history. She belonged to a prominent collector, Colonel Bob Henderson, who took her everywhere with him - even to his landing on the D-Day beaches, where he was a small arms adviser to Field Marshal Montogomery.
Read that quote over again... Colonel Bob Henderson, decorated officer of the British Military, collected Teddy Bears and carried one everywhere.
Further... Japanese businessman Yoshihiro Sekiguchi spent £110,000 to buy Col. Henderson's Teddy Bear at auction!
Don't let anybody make you feel shy about being a Bear collector!
Teddy Bear collecting is a very serious and, possibly, expensive hobby! You are in the company of some very prominent people!
You'll find nothing but sympathetic ears here. 
As you say, feeling an attachment to a lost bear is extremely common...and sad, too. The good news is that the same feeling can lead us to appreciate the bears we still have.
You're in great company as an adult collector: http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic … immaturity
Becky
There is nothing wrong with collecting bears, we do it for so many reasons.
You may have already tried this, but if i want to look for a bear, i type something in google such as 'green bear' then go to the top and press images. You will get pages and pages of green bears to look through, and you might, just might see yours.
Boechout, AntwerpAnd I say that because I am pretty sure that this lime green guy came from a gift shop or flower shop. I have tried for years now to replace it and for the life of me - I can't even find a sign that it ever even existed! But I don't expect any answers - I am sort of beyond expecting the possibility of a replacement now. I don't believe it's going to happen and I certainly can't count on it, so I just enjoy the teddy bears I still have. :-)
I don't know, but maybe it's best to keep your memories of your lime green guy and NOT try to replace him? Among my childhood teddies there was a beautiful big rocking horse with a long white tail; over the years it got so worn out that my parents decided to throw him out. I still regret this, but that doesn't mean I want to find a replacement for him. :rose:
On the other hand, if you are really have your heart set on having a new lime green guy, you could always try and find a bear maker who'd be willing to make one for you.
I've been sort of "in the closet" with my teddy bear obsession. I've loved stuffed animals since I was little and I guess I never outgrew it. But now my tastes run towards teddy bears specifically. I am just sooo embarrassed to admit it. But I guess there are worse things to be guilty of in life than having a... a "few" >_>... teddy bears.
Admittedly I wasn't very keen to admit my fascination with teddy bears at first either; but now I am actually quite proud of it. :teddybear:
As Randy and Becky already explained, there is absolutely nothing wrong with collecting teddy bears; and don't get me started about the amazing therapeutic powers of teddy bears. Seriously, there is much scientific proof that teddy bears have a very beneficial influence on children's and adults mental and physical health (think about organisations like "Good Bears of the world" and "Hugs across America"). So you are in good company and don't let anybody convince you otherwise.
Tami Eveslage Original Teddy BearsHi Mad Hatter! Welcome! Youa re in the right place. Don't be embarrassed. Check out the quote in my signature!
Miser BearsUS Bears, your bear lodge sounds amazing! My bears are slowly taking over my office, they will be demanding tenancy rights next. And if you guys think you have it bad, I spend far too long coming up with back stories for my teds. One even runs a smuggling ring...
PennsylvaniaTenancy rights? Ha! Bears outnumber humans in this house, 500 to 1! They don't live with us. We live with them! ;)
Yes, every Bear has a story. When and where he was adopted. What vacation or special day. Who gave him to us.
Then, after they've been with you for a while, each one's personality begins to come out. We have some very precocious Bears. We have some Bears who like to snuggle on the sofa while we watch TV. We have some Bears who prefer to sit on their shelves and pretend to be king of all they survey.
There are benefits. When my wife asks me who took all the cookies from the cookie jar, it's always the Bears who ate them. 
Posts: 6Us Bears, your post is fascinating and knowing a Colonel took a teddy bear with him to D-Day does a lot to make one feel less "self-conscious!" :-)
dangerbears, I love that article (and also the photo in the article!)! I bookmarked it. :-)
Jenbee, I did try that, but thank you for the suggestion. I still consider myself sort of an internet-amateur though, so it never hurts to throw those ideas out there in case I hadn't tried it. Thank you again. :-)
peterbear, I agree with you completely. (And it's a long and not-so-great story, but in a way, I am not entirely upset I got rid of it - it had a lot of associations that were not exactly positive, being a gift. I usually am the only one who buys me teddy bears.) So, in many ways, it is probably good it's gone. However, since it's been ten years, a few years back, I *did* try to replace it with a couple look-alikes that don't actually look a lot like one another or like the original. But they are cute (I can be pretty choosy about teddy bears) and they are now two of my all time favorites... and, even better, there are and can be no negativity associated with these guys since I got them myself. So, I'm happy. :-)
Tami E, I love your signature! :-D
Miser, you have a teddy in the back of the group sticking up a bit that when I look at it all I can think is "It's Captain Kirk!" (that is a good thing, if you were wondering) :-)
I can't believe I forgot to mention that I was (AM) so impressed when I was looking through the photos on this site of handmade teddy bears. I cannot believe the immense amount of talent! All I can do is crochet and knit (mostly, I crochet these days) - sewing and I don't get along too well. After looking at all those photos, I feel like a kid putting up little chicken-scratch sketches, but here are my teddy bear patterns (they are all totally free, but I think that'll be obvious):
Thank you everyone for the responses and niceness and kind words and welcoming and... etc. :-)
You are welcome I love your little crochet teds, the star trek one is awesome, i think i like the scrap ted the best.
Miser BearsThant Sticky up bear is Grumbleduke. I found him in a second hand shop for 50p, he was so rubbish compared to the other bears around, that I had to rescue him.
UKUS Bears, your bear lodge sounds amazing! My bears are slowly taking over my office, they will be demanding tenancy rights next. And if you guys think you have it bad, I spend far too long coming up with back stories for my teds. One even runs a smuggling ring...
I'm 35, male and I still love Teddies of all sorts. I don't go for the very expensive types, just ones that caught my eye, or I found 'abandoned' in the street, I can't pass them by and leave them there. I also make up back stories for all my Teds...for example, in my avatar is one Tom Lion, named Tom because he reminded me of Tom Baker, former Dr Who. Tom is from aristocratic Teddy stock, he was the former 10th Duke of Guildford but abdicated after personal family tragedies and taking on the title at a time in his life when he wasn't ready, so he decided to abdicate and travel, soul searching on his way...he ended up in our world, the Human world which runs parallel to the Teddy World and at a very low point in his life he was spotted by my other well loved friend Poochie (see other topic I made on him) and he invited him into our house when I was a baby and my Mum let him stay...the rest as they say is history...Oh, and his former, proper surname was 'Lyon' but he changed it so no one would realise his more prolific family name, the Lyon's hail all the way back to Roman times, with branches all over the world like the Von Lyons of Germany who are the Rothschild's of the Teddy World or the McLyons Dukedom of Cairngorn, Scotland who run a Naval defence company in Faslane, Scotland with their vast lands on their estate at Cairngorn Castle...His family were awarded their Dukedom and Guildford Palace for his ancestor, General Thomas John Lyon for his masterful leadership and victory at The Battle of Blenheim as well as loyalty to the Crown during the English Civil War...
I also have a very small Nici Crocodile called Colin, who has 'CTS' which is 'Comparative Teddy Smallism'. Its a genetic condition that leads to some Teddies to give birth to miniature sized offspring even when the parents are 'normal' sized. The child grows healthily but grows in miniature to the adult. Teddies such as these need love and affection, especially from a human companion as this somewhat nurtures both their physical as well as emotional well-being...they also have VAST appetites, they can eat meals far greater in size i.e. even human sized portions as they have stomachs that are 'dimensionally transcendental' i.e. bigger on the inside than out' - Teddy scientists have yet to replicate the process artificially...perhaps they never will. Teddies with smallism also can have normal sized siblings...
Beat that if you will...I am rather...mad. 
and thats just some of my backstories...
Posts: 6Cool responses! (I didn't even see that last reply until just before I began this post - I was away from this forum for a while.)
I thought I should clarify why I get embarrassed about teddy bears even though I posted this a while ago.
I feel very embarrassed about the bears I own, but most of it (and I can't shake it) has to do with worry, I think:
1) worry about seeming indulgent and uncaring to people who are having a hard time making ends meet in these tough times (actually I am having a hard time with that, too - I am just very fortunate to have a great deal of support from very amazing people)
2) worry that I will make my boyfriend worry about me being "too materialistic" - and also, I worry that he might think I have teddy bears because he isn't giving me enough attention (which isn't true at all! He is amazing and not only takes such great care of me, but gives me lots of love and attention.)
3) worry that my boyfriend will think that my bears take up too much space, or that he won't like them "hanging around" when we are sharing a place - that they'll annoy him in some way. I should mention, I am planning to move in with him and his family soon (see also: hard times mentioned in worry #1).
4) worry that it will be too much cost/effort/expense to hang onto what I have (this worry actually applies to a LOT of other stuff, too; clothes, books, etc.)
5) worry that I will get so attached to the bears that if/when I do ever have to get rid of all or most, it will be a heart-breaking thing that I can't forgive myself for even getting into. By that I mean, my train of thought would go like "Sure, it may have only cost me 99 cents, but if I hadn't spent that in the first place, I would never have had to deal with the tragedy of losing something I enjoyed and turning a good thing into a bad thing. Whereas, if the bear were a gift, I never decided to "get" it. However, I may still have gotten attached to it and would still blame myself if I got rid of it. So, the whole thing turns into a sort of stress, in a way.
6) I am not even sure this counts and I really really don't want it to come across the wrong way (I'm at the point where all I want is to get along and for other people to get along with me - they don't have to love me or even like me, just... not hate me or resent me), but my entire life, my mom has been pointing out how much better my life is than hers "ever was" when she was growing up. I have lived at home for a few years after things went wrong in life and I had to do that or become homeless or something. (It involved a guy who turned out to be alcoholic and abusive - beyond that, I don't want to go into it except that I learned some important lessons like "don't rely on someone else to be right all the time - do your own homework," and some false lessons that I've had to purge to be able to be ok "like don't ever believe a man if he says he loves you or wants to be with you for life") It has taken a lot of hard work from my boyfriend to convince me that he isn't going anywhere and I want to be the best girlfriend I can be - because he more than deserves it and I love him more than anything. I am moving to his place because my parents have to sell the house and move into an apartment where there won't be room for me or for my brother.
I got off-track, (but to preface this, I may still seem off-track) my mom has not been picking up food for the house except for her and my father. My brother and I have been pooling together money to get food to stay fed - but then the leftovers are often eaten by other people. My dad will ask "can the kids join us for lunch?" and she will reply with "there isn't enough food for all of us." If this sounds made up, I understand, but it sadly isn't. She gets mad at me for showering (it wastes water), mad for flushing the toilet downstairs after it is used (it wastes water), and mad when I do laundry (it wastes water). She also gets mad when I eat out or eat at home - it is either "wasting money" or I'm "making too much of a mess." However, as mentioned before, eating at home is not an option because there isn't enough (or any, at times) food here to do so. The last time she came into my room, she sneered at the dozen or so teddy bears on my bed and laughingly said "Your life is soo much better than mine ever was." Another time, it was a comment like "You don't even know how lucky you are," which is far from the truth. For example, I used to get suicidal over being afraid that I couldn't make my own way in this world because I knew the only reason I was (and am) ok is just through the good graces of other people in my life. And though I still worry about how to make my own way, I try not to consider ending it all just because of that, even though it stresses me out that I don't have a job at the moment. I've often hoped that no one else has felt that way with how the world has been lately because its not a great feeling.
Anyways, I have always felt a huge sense of shame, not just about collecting teddy bears, but about merely existing on this planet. I feel like I have no right to be here or that I am not worthy of life or existence, even though that isn't really how I feel. I feel like I do have the right to be here only because I value human life over material possessions, but I also fear being seen as other than that (so again, I worry about what people would think of the bears). I think I only feel that way because I should have been much farther in life by now. So, in my case, my teddy bears serve to remind me that I may have never grown up - I may be just as inept and ineffective at dealing with life, people and the world as I was when I was just a little girl with her Bunny (my first teddy was not a teddy - it was a white rabbit that seemed like it used to be bigger than I was at one time). I would really like to hear/read honest input on whether anyone here thinks I should actually have teddy bears at all. Is it possible that having teddy bears (even if you don't collect them) is hazardous to the mental health of some people? People like me?
I haven't forgotten the article that was linked in another post - but I have been worried if in the realm of "collecting," especially teddy bears, if I shouldn't be here. The last thing I would want to do (among other things) is through having bears of my own, give other bear collectors a bad rap or a bad reputation. As in, I don't want people to think "Oh she has teddy bears because she is troubled and needy and sounds like she doesn't have the greatest relationship with her mother. How pathetic." and then the dreaded progression from that is "maybe all bear collectors have issues." Which, from what I've seen, after looking into it much more, isn't true at all.
I have always liked teddy bears and soft stuffed animals a lot. I don't know why, but I do. And I'm not sure it has anything at all to do with anything else emotional or psychological that is going on. I just like them.
There is a part in the new Silent Hill movie that made me feel light years better about owning even one bear. It was a scene with a guy on a bus looking at and (I think) cuddling a little plush Robbie the Rabbit (which I WILL be making someday =D). That scene made my mind jump and go "Hey! He has a plush toy, so it must be ok for me to have one, too!" which was like a huge epiphany for me. It shouldn't be, but it is.
After giving this issue more and more thought, I keep coming to this one and only conclusion:
It is ok for people to collect and own as many teddy bears as they want. But it is NOT ok for ME to own ANY.
So why the hell do I keep thinking that?
This post turned out to be a lot longer than I intended, but I just wanted to bring up one more thing because it feels similar to this, even though its a different subject. I am a girl and I feel like I can't wear pink because I feel like it would... emasculate me! =O
My fascination with teddy bears and stuffed animals has always been one of the greatest unsolved mysteries of my life. Lol!
I don't know where it came from or why I like them at all, but I do know this - I'm going to learn to make teddy bears (the proper & traditional way - by sewing, not crocheting).
Posts: 298I don't think that you should feel guilty about having bears. If you feel that they contribute something to your life (give you joy, or make you feel safe or comfortable), then keep them. I can understand not wanting to buy more, at the moment, because of finances or having to move, but surely the ones that you already have aren't doing anyone any harm. About your current living situation- that sounds REALLY difficult. I hope that things will be better for you when you move! Most importantly: You ARE worthy of life and existence. You are worth something. I know from experience how easy it is to get into the mindset where you think that you "don't deserve to be happy." It's a terrible place to be. You deserve to be happy, just as much as anyone else does. 
