I am wondering if the ingress into the Venus ruled sign of Libra over the past week is bringing me to think so much of past relationships that ended… possibly highlighted by the fact we had the full moon opposing it in Aries just a short time ago. For those who may not know a lot about astrology the whole thing works in polarities of energy for us as humans having archetypal experiences, at least in the psychological form of astrology I began to study from 1993 onwards..
The polarity of Venus Mars relates to the opposition between the signs Aries (ruled by Mars) and Libra (ruled by Venus… but note that Taurus is ruled by Venus too but a more bodily than heady Venus energy) and both Mars and Venus are placed in our charts somewhere.. There is a Mars force in both women and men and a Venus force in women and men, it is just that often one force may dominate due to the person’s temperament, sign placements and upbringing for astrology shows where nature and nurture intersect.
My last partner had what is a called a conflicted Moon, this means his relationship with his mother was fraught and that his mother struggled too with his father’s addiction.. The placement of the Moon in Pisces which is a soft feminine sign related to Neptune and the ocean can be problematic for men in our heroic culture.. With Phil it was a strong counterbalance to his Sun Mars conjunction in Capricorn and Aquarius, two of the stronger more independent, go it alone signs (although Aquarians have a love of humanity) they often need a lot of space or distance due to remote parenting as well as the super sensitivity they bring in as children that often marks them out from the crowd in some way. Aquarius is an air sign.. they have strong intelligence and deep feeling but find it difficult at times handling others feelings. This kind of signature also applies in part to any personal planet, Sun Moon Venus or Mars associated to the ruler of Aquarius, Uranus.)
Phil’s Moon was conjunct Chiron in Pisces which showed a deep relational wound to the feminine feelings and mother, that is carried multi-generationally.. His moon also opposed both Uranus and Pluto, so when he ‘blew’ it could be intense but he had also had a fear of such eruptions as his father was violent. After one argument we had Phil told me he saw, as a child, his father kick his mother in the stomach.. He often said to me.. “you are too vulnerable and I will only hurt you” discussing this with therapists in the aftermath of the break up it wasn’t me that was emotionally vulnerable in that I had access by then to feelings due to having over 13 years of sobriety when we met but it was still hard for me to find my words where feelings were concerned and when I was overcome it would set him off into a rage…It was really Phil who found vulnerable feelings hard to cope with and as therapist remind me vulnerability and intimacy are co-related.. its hard to be truly intimate with a person whose past wounds make them vulnerable but that person also needs our understanding and empathy and emotional insight.
I was thinking so much of Phil at 4.30 am this morning so I am writing this to articulate some of what went on in my mind.. I thought of how we came to break up for the final time around Christmas when my Dutch family chose to visit. At the time Phil and I were far away on the other side of Australia travelling and it was decided only I could fly home, as Phil had a dog Sally with him and we could not find accommodation here at home for Sal. To cut a long story short we ended up having a falling out over me delaying my return due to Mum being ill and our emails got mixed up, Phil got super angry with me and called me a lot of names and I got super angry back… I can look at it all now and understand his frustration.. I can also see it was too hard to manage without therapy as by that time he must have broken it off about 4 times.. I am still sad to say I labelled him a narcissist for a while as he was so hard on me feeling wise.. and he said so many many nasty things about me both during the relationship and when we broke up that therapists have said were neither fair or true considering my very painful and traumatic attachment history.. but I understand it all now and don’t struggle with all that blame he dumped on me, but it took many years of therapy to get free of it.
Phil used to get angry when I had a painful period.. He could not bare me sitting and holding the hand of my older sister when she was in a terrible way at the home and stormed out.. He got angry when I got close to his Mum on a visit to meet her and then angry when I cried too much when his father was ill with a similar cancer to the one that took my Dad…he once said to me when I was sad and needed a hug “I am not your Teddy Bear.” and he would go off for hours surfing and drop me when on a date to talk on the phone to friends leaving me waiting hours.. Anyway enough about all of that.. the purpose of this is not to take Phil’s emotional inventory, only to unpack some of what went down.
The truth is we both came from families affected by multi-generational trauma and addiction issues so it was definately a kind of fate when we met while I was living alone at the coast suffering from the affects of the traumatic head injury I sustained on the first anniversary of my ex husband leaving me. Attachments and relationships have been so problematic for me.. Understanding how disordered my attachment style can be at times with a longing for closeness, vying with a fear of both abandonment and engulfment has taken time. I have undergone partners walking out about 5 times and the initial abandonment was my much loved older sister leaving after marrying when I was just 3 and then having a Mum who preferred working to mothering and another sister who could be abusive as she was being neglected emotionally too.
I also went through the terrible trauma of seeing what happened to my older sister when her partner sent her home in a very damaged state back in 1983 and then we lost touch with her four sons who were closer in age to me than any of my siblings.. Terminations happened for me from then on in, until I got sober in 1993, and I am not proud of that but I also know I made the responsible choice not bringing babies to term seeing I was still very damaged.. That said when I make friends now born in the 1980s I cannot help but think how it would be to have had children around the same age now. I look forward to a lonely old age without them I guess but then not all parents and children get on and I have seen my sister not always treated with much tenderness and compassion by one of her sons…
I am sure all of this is on my mind too as Venus transits closer to my Uranus in the first house at 29 Leo as Mars sextiles it.. Uranus in the first now speaks to me of the ancestral separation from family my GG Grandfather on Mum’s side Thomas Matts Trudgeon suffered. I have been left, just as he was. I have moved to live on the other side of the world at age 37 just as he did.. Its just I started on the therapeutic pathway that made me look inward to see how the entire constellation affected all of us.
I am therefore very interested in the work of Mark Wolynn and his teacher Bert Hellinger who does family constellation therapy.. According to Hellinger if someone gets cut out of the family system that leaves a gravitational force field that a descendant’s experience must fill or bring to awareness.. I believe there is such a thing as family and ancestral fate, it interest me more than other ideas of ‘karma’ which do not seem to make as much sense, but that is only my opinion.
I also read in a book on family therapy many years ago that I found while staying with a friend that family cut offs may cause schizophrenia or other emotional disorders in subsequent kids affected. I have seen that happen with a niece my sister law cut off from my sister.. She ended up having a breakdown at the same age as my sister was when she had her aneurysm.
Wolynn explains in his book It Didn’t Start With You that when we cut the flow of love to a parent from a child that has consequences.. yes, the parent may have been neglectful or abusive but why? Maybe I am wrong and its better to walk away but my mind seeks unity not division.. In the same way I forgive Phil and feel grateful for the 4 years in which we at least ‘tried’ to relate, become close and love.. Truth is we failed so many times, both of us, but the ending of a relationship is not only a failure, to me it represents a golden opportunity to learn and grow.. If we continue only to see past relationships as a ‘mistake’ we forsake a valuable opportunity to grow in both self and other awareness, as well as in insight, wisdom and love.
Surely emotional cut offs happen? are all part of life and relationship struggles. If any planetary signature relates to them perhaps it is the planet Uranus.. We are dealing with a lot of cutting off that began just as Saturn entered the sign Aquarius earlier in the year that is ruled by Uranus.. It moved retrograde for a while and is now in Capricorn but started to move direct this week. Cut off happens for purposes of protection but energy is not destroyed by being subverted, it has to go somewhere.. As Saturn and Pluto met we also saw buried resentment, anger and rage of racial bigotry with associated conflict, trauma and tension emerge earlier in the year..
Saturn Pluto meetings remind us we have to summon the courage to look our death, immortality, painful feelings and vulnerability squarely in the face.. Allied with Mars there can be a lot of frustration and feelings of powerlessness. The alternative is to deny, bury, mask, run and hide… which works for a while, but only for a while.. for the reaper comes for us eventually even if that means having to undergo a pruning or confrontation with a painful reality in some form or another that would it would be better in the long run for us to face.
Emerging From The Dark Night 