Roleplaying of an entirely different kind..

A friend was telling me today about a girl he knows that's pregnant in Second Life. I've seen pregnant women in Second Life for a long time now, but I've never really looked into the details.. until today. What follows is the notecard I was given at Sweet DreamzZ Maternity Clinic in Second Life:

Sweet DreamzZ Maternity Clinic
Making your sweetest dreams come true!!
Owned by Kaeko Freenote
--> Assistant Manager: Groovyloopylou Aya
--> Clinical Assistants: Mae Burton, Paisley Lancaster

Congratulations on your new addition, and thank you for choosing Sweet DreamzZ Maternity Clinic! We are the affordable alternative that is making the dream of bringing a baby into the world achievable for every family in SecondLife! In SL, having a baby (either with the one you love or all by yourself!) is the fulfillment of a dream. It is an opportunity to experience something dramatic and beautiful, to create a lasting memory, to build upon a relationship or to live out dreams that aren't attainable in your first life. We at Sweet DreamzZ know how important this experience is to you, and will do everything in our power to make your memory a wonderful one.

Sweet DreamzZ is owned and staffed by Midwife Kaeko Freenote. Kaeko is a mother three times over IRL and also a mother in 2nd life, and has delivered SL babies many times over. She is experienced with many varied birth and labor situations. She and our staff are able to provide prenatal care, labor and delivery in a calm, relaxing setting, and recovery care for mommy and baby. You will never be surprised by someone you don't know appearing to deliver your baby, or run your ultrasound. We offer waterbirths, traditional deliveries, c-sections - you call the shots and let us know what you would be comfortable experiencing.

Best of all, all of our services can be purchased a la carte - so there is no costly bundle to purchase. YOU decide which services are important to your experience, and are affordable for your family. We work by appointment only - so please review the services below, and then contact one of the clinical assistants listed above via IM to set up a consultation appointment.

***** PLEASE BE AWARE: We operate on a NO REFUNDS basis. Unless there was something substantially and measurably wrong with your experience, we will not refund your money. If you get divorced, we will support you through your pregnancy, and hope the baby will bring you joy. If you decide to discontinue your pregnancy, we will be happy to consider holding your package as a prepaid package, and let you use it when you're happily settled again. But we will not refund the purchase - that is simply not fair to us, to you, or to your baby. *****

-> Pregnancy Testing Kits -$25L

SweetDreamzZ is proud to announce the addition of an interactive, working pregnancy test! Our Clearblue tests are affordable and easy to use, and you can purchase them at any time. We have a vendor setup in our lobby. :o) For $25L, the vendor will give you a pregnancy test. Simply purchase the test, take it home and open it up. The test will give you either a positive or a negative result. If it's positive, congratulations!! Come on, and we will be happy to set up your SweetDreamzZ maternity package. :o)


-> Prenatal Visits
* Consultation Visit - $100L: The consultation visit will include taking your order for your birth experience, giving you information, scheduling any future visits and setting up your delivery date. At this visit we will also answer any questions you might have, and can discuss what kind of delivery you are looking for.

* Prenatal Care Visit - $175-250L: You may schedule as many prenatal care visits as you are comfortable with. The fee will be charged per visit. We offer three tiers of prenatal care visits.

--> Clinical Exam - $175L: At these visits, we will take your weight, discuss how your pregnancy is developing, do a breast, abdominal and pelvic exam to make sure everyone is healthy. We will listen for baby's heartbeat. We will offer advice on making your SL pregnancy comfortable and rewarding.

--> Sonogram - $175L: At these visits, we will do an abdominal exam, discuss your pregnancy, and take a sonogram image of baby to make sure he or she is growing as expected. A copy of the sonogram picture, personalized with notes from your visit, will be provided free of charge.

--> Combo - $250L: These visits will include a complete clinical exam as well as a sonogram exam and a personalized copy of the picture.

-> Delivery
There will be a flat $500L charge for your delivery. Water birth, stirrup birth and traditional birthing beds will be available for you to choose from, as well as a c-section option if you feel that your pregnancy is in danger. We offer a labor ball for you to rock on if you so choose. You may move around, labor in one way and then later move to another location - you control how you experience your labor. We will, of course, need to do occasional cervix checks to make sure dilation and effacement are appropriate, but when we are not checking the cervix you are free to move about the center to labor however is comfortable for you. After delivery, you will be given the opportunity to relax in our beautiful recovery suite with your baby.

-> Pregnancy Shapes, Physical Baby, HUDs and AOs

* Shapes: Sweet DreamzZ knows that some people are very attached to their shapes, and that some people haven't perfected theirs yet, but that everyone wants their body to change as they progress in their pregnancy! If you are experienced with editing your shape, you can simply modify it week by week, increasing breast size, stomach size, saddlebag size, rear end size, thickness and thighs. If you are not experienced, we would be happy to help you! For $200L, we can provide a set of generic shapes to be used throughout your pregnancy. If your current shape is full permission (meaning that it is modable and transferable) our designer will be happy to modify it for you to create pregnancy shapes for your current look. This service is $350L.

* Babies: We have partnered with a wonderful designer to provide customized babies for our families. We now offer two different levels of baby, and will soon add a third level. :o) We hope to fulfill the economic and aesthetic of every client who wants to use our clinic.

--> Basic - $300L: These babies are our very basic babies, meant for families with lower incomes. They come with an interaction HUD...but they are very cute, relatively low prim, and will look adorable as you carry and place them. Hair and skin are customizable, and we will discuss these options when you place your order. Additionally, the babies wear hats and booties that can be removed, as well as binkies. These babies coo, giggle and cry randomly, just like real babies. As an affordable solution for budget-conscious families, they are a remarkable choice!!

--> Vers. 2 - $600L: These babies are a step up, but still affordable for those watching a tight bottom line. These babies come with prim hair, available in a wide selection of styles and colors. There are four different clothing options to chose from, and a plethora of texture and color options for those clothes. They do not come with a HUD, but cry, coo and giggle randomly, like the basic baby. They come with booties and pacifiers which are removable by chat script.

--> Vers. 3 - TBD: These babies will be released sometime this month. Adorable like the Ver. 2, and with an equally wide choice of hair and skin colors, clothing styles and textures. The big difference here is that these babies come with a HUD. Interactive, you will be able to change colors and textures on their clothing, remove and give them their pacifiers, you can add and remove booties, plus you can give them a bottle and take the bottle away....all by HUD. You will also be able to turn their coos and giggles on and off, and they will whisper in response to actions you take with them. These are going to be very, very cool babies, and we can't wait till they're ready for release!

If you do not wish to purchase one of our babies but prefer to buy your baby elsewhere, that's not a problem.

If you purchase your baby from us, you will be given your child in the recovery room after birth. We need to weigh, examine, and clean up baby before we hand them over. If you purchase your baby elsewhere, we will use one of our birthing babies for the delivery, and will have you hold your baby for the first time once he or she has been cleaned up and checked out. To be clear, you will keep your baby in your inventory throughout the labor and delivery process, bringing it out once we've given the word after labor and delivery. We wish to avoid inventory transfers, because we all know how SL likes to eat things when they are in limbo.

* HUDs: HUDs are the wonderful tummy-talking devices that pregnant women all over SL use to help them role play their pregnancies, and to share the experience. SweetDreamzZ is currently partnered with creator Coal Edge to offer the Interactive Tummy-Talker via a vendor in our lobby. We believe this product to be the absolute best tummy-whispering product on the market, and Coal Edge's assistants to be absolutely fantastic to work with. Not only does the HUD simulate cravings and feelings for the mother, but it is interactive with partner and anyone else you wish to allow to interact. If you don't want anyone intereacting, you can block them from doing so. The most remarkable part of this HUD is the labor simulator, simulating contractions and even your water breaking! We highly, highly recommend this product!

* AOs: AOs are what will make your avatar stand, sit and walk like a pregnant woman. There are a number of affordable maternity AOs on the market, and if you're really clever, you can make your own by buying the poses you like and loading them into a HUD. SweetDreamzZ offers the FixedBit Pregnancy AO via a vendor in our lobby. We very much enjoyed this AO during our pregnancies, and can highly recommend it.

-> Labor and Delivery Photos

If your loved ones just aren't very talented photographers and you would like to have lots of pictures of your blessed event, please let us know. Kaeko is quite talented at capturing beautiful birth moments, and whichever is not assisting you with delivery will be more than happy to take the pictures. We will ask $25L per picture taken. You can let us know how many pictures you would like taken, and if you would like us to decide the shots, or if you would like us to pick what we think will be best.

-> Surprise, Surprise!

You made it this far into the notecard, so we know you're as excited about your impending birth as we are!! At Sweet DreamzZ, we know that what can make a birth even more special is the element of surprise. We're happy to accomodate you with this in roleplaying your prenatal visits (maybe you will have a condition requiring nearly complete bedrest! Maybe you'll be required to drink more milk!), your labor (could baby be breech??), or in picking the color of baby's eyes or hair for you. Just tell us during your consultation: Surpise Me!

Additionally, every so often at Sweet DreamzZ we discover at birth a set of twins where only one baby was expected!! Surprise twins incur no extra charges from the parents, just the necessity for a bigger crib and more diapers, and the ability to share lots more love. :oD

The bottom line is that, at Sweet DreamzZ, you really NEVER know what will happen!

-> Roleplay

What we want you to know about your SL pregnancy is that what makes it the most special is YOU! Get involved, and don't be embarassed to actively role play your pregnancy. Are your ankles swollen? Does your tummy itch where the skin is stretching to accomodate baby? Do you have a sudden hankering for pancakes and mint chocolate chip ice cream? Are you starting to feel some pain in your lower back, or Braxton-Hicks contractions? Don't be shy - say it out loud! Express it!! Buy yourself a mint-chocolate chip ice cream cone, and wear it everywhere! Think you might be going into labor early - IM us and see if we have an appointment time available to take you now! If not, maybe we can give you some medicine to hold labor off a little longer. If you're not afraid of roleplaying, especially if you've got a good partner or support team, you won't even need a HUD to help you make the experience realistic. We assure you, we will not be shy about roleplaying the clinical visits and delivery. That experience is what we're here for!! :o)

If you like what you've read and would like to schedule your consultation, or if you need more information, please IM Kaeko Freenote to set up a consultation time. Sometimes Kaeko will be immediately available, and sometimes she will need to schedule it for later. And sometimes she does sleep, so be patient and we promise, we will get back to you! No customer is ever forgotten or overlooked. We feel honored that you are inviting us to be a part of this experience, and we take that responsibility very seriously.

Thank you for your interest in Sweet DreamzZ! We look forward to making your sweetest dreams come true!
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Sweet DreamzZ Pricing List:

Consultation Meeting (not optional): $100L
Delivery (not optional): $500L
Prenatal Clinical Visits (optional): $175L per visit
Prenatal Sonogram Visit (optional): $175L per visit (includes personalized picture)
Combo Prenatal Visit (optional): $250L per visit (includes personalized picture)
Custom Pregnancy Shapes (optional): $350L
Generic Pregnancy Shapes (optional): $200L
Sweet DreamzZ Baby (optional): $300-600L per baby
Labor and Delivery Photos: $25L per shot.

Midwife Kaeko Freenote welcomes your inquiries! ;o)

I have so much to say that I don't even know where to begin.

Ok now.. I'm really not being judgemental here, cause I'm an open-minded girl and I honestly *do* want to understand why people get pregnant in Second Life. I also wonder.. how many babies do you think people just keep in their inventory? How many 'perfect relationships' go wrong in Second Life after that baby comes along? I really think it's a lot like when I played Barbies with my sister when we were younger and when Barbie got into a 'boring' situation (typically after she and Ken were married and had a baby) my sister and I would declare a "Do-Over" and start again so Barbie could be single and do whatever she wanted.

I still think there's a market here somewhere for an SL abortion clinic, but I'm seriously considering giving this a whirl just to see what sort of pregnancy fetishists turn up.

-xopixox