Are You Cinderella or An Ugly Step-Sister?
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| The ugly step-sisters flank Cinderella in last year’s panto at the Oxford Playhouse. |
What is it about our brothers and sisters?
It’s the longest relationship for most of us. And so often it is a knot of jealousy and loyalty, love and loathing, betrayal and trust. We share a history, we take each other for granted, we totally misunderstand each other, we know each other better than anyone…which is it?
It may well be the most complex relationship any of us have. And if you’re lucky (or unlucky) enough to have a brother or sister, this relationship will have coloured the whole formation of your character – although you might not thinks so. Were you bullied or a bully? Were you babied or a baby? Were you the responsible one? Or the temperamental one?
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| Cain kills Abel. Gustav Doré |
In the past month or so, a number of people have come to me for readings with a similar issue at the core of their charts. They’ve been prompted to come for a wide range of reasons, but all have turned out to have a deep issue with a brother or sister.
Seldom does the subject of the sibling come up at first, but after we’ve been talking around things for a while, after we’ve started to really get into the chart together, the toxic sibling surfaces. Several people I’ve talked to have not spoken to a sibling for more than a decade.
Sibling relationships are amazingly rarely discussed in the psychological literature. It’s a curious oversight, because this is likely the longest relationship that most of us will have. On the other hand, sibling relations are a central theme in folk and fairy tales. The disappearance of brothers and sisters from our discourse about the family is a feature of 20th century thinking.
The same thing has happened with astrology. There’s a focus on father, mother, self and partner that excludes other relationships to the detriment of really understanding how an individual ticks.
And there’s a key word – individual. I don’t know why we lost sight of our brothers and sisters last century, but it could be to do with a central story of our current culture: boy meets girl, they marry, they breed, they die. This romantic trajectory is still supposedly the main life journey on which we are all engaged. But as we know, especially if you study astrology, life is a lot more complicated.
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| Brother has been turned into a little deer in this illustration by HJ Ford in The Red Fairy Book |
In astrology, the third house is reserved for siblings, so are the sign Gemini and the planet Mercury. Planets in the third or Gemini or conjunct Mercury will tell you something about how you feel about your siblings. If you have nothing that chimes with this, look at the ruler of your third house.
Remember that these planets are not your brother or sister per se, but how you perceive them, how they are to you.
Here’s something different that I have found to be important.
Keep in mind that your natal chart is a snapshot of the situation you are born into (as well as a portrait of you). So you can also find clues to the sibling relationship in the first and seventh houses. For example, planets exactly on the descendant often describe the older brother or sister, or simply the situation with them.
Why?
The seventh house is the house of equals, also rivals. If you were born with, say, Chiron, on the descendant, who would that Chiron be? Think about it.
Dig around on Donna Cunningham’s excellent site, Sky Writer, for some insights into sibling relationships.
Love that crazy pantomime vibe.
My brother and I were close growing up. He was like a third parent to me (he’s a Capricorn). I have North Node in my third house, in Libra. Many years ago he developed serious controlling issues, and then became mean and spiteful to me, and really hurt me when I was down. It was very painful and I’ve never gotten over it and I don’t think I ever will. So maybe it’s that Chiron conjunct my Descendant.
Thank u for writting this article, i thought i was the only weirdoo not talkin to my bro for nearly a decade 🙂
@leslee – one pattern I’ve noticed is the older sibling being unable to let go of his (or her) controlling status as the younger one develops. This seems to happen when the younger one starts reaching adulthood mid-teens up.
Chiron conjunct the desc is a likely reflection of that. I do think that once you can feel this, it’s easier to move on. I also think that one of the things about the sibling relationship is exactly what you say. Sometimes you just can’t heal it.
@ella – shame is also one of the patterns I see. I’ve never had anyone actually come to see me about the sibling relationship. They always come for some other reason. Then it crops up. People are ashamed because they feel it as a deep personal failure. Because your sib knew you as a child, the silence is profoundly wounding.
Thanks for this post! I have a younger sister, but unlike the other cases I wanted her to finally grow up, I was always worried for a long time. My mom encouraged closeness and never created situations were rivalry would rise, we’re both close and thankful for that. I think parents play also an important part in the sibling relationship.
We’ve had rough patches, but we’ve being working honestly to heal.
With my moon hit by pluto, sat, uranus, my relationship with the women in the family has being revised, readjusted. She’s actually helped me a great deal lately, especially dealing with my mom (she had to go through the same transits few years earlier).
Her sun and moon are conj my asc. And I have neptune in 3rd, exact sextile my moon in 1rst.
The bit about Chiron really clicked. There’s an underlying rivalry between my brother and I that has never really been explored. It’s a rivalry about who suffers / has suffered the most, I think.
It’s also very illuminating about relationships in general. I tend to compete with people in general; this interpretation of the 7th explains a lot.
And yes, I have Chiron in the 7th. Ouch.
@Sabrina – You’re completely right about parents behaviour creating or exacerbating situations. You may be born within a certain set of circumstances but things can be alleviated.
The synastry with your sister sounds really positive.
Donna Cunningham has quite a lot to say about Neptune in the third. I think she has that placement. But it does not really chime with what you say, since it’s more of the negative manifestations of Neptune than the positive (imaginative, artistic, altruistic) ones.
@P – 7th house…rivalry…Chiron. It makes sense. And if you can acknowledge how this Ur-relationship works, then you can move on…
I have Uranus and Pluto in the third – and my relationship with my sisters is horribly twisted. Jealous and tight. It’s made even more complicated by our partners. My wife is jealous of my sisters too. I’ve had to make a choice – them or her.
Christine, you have a point there about the older sibling not wanting to give up controlling status (exacerbated by some personal issues in my brother’s case that go way beyond me).
The Neptune angle is also interesting. I have Neptune in the 3rd, 5 degrees from my IC. I forget to count it as a 3rd house planet (it’s also conjunct Jupiter 2 degrees earlier). Anyway, I think I idolized my brother when I was young. The final straw in our problems happened when my progressed Sun and progressed Neptune were *exactly* conjunct. Guess the Sun shone a bright light through those illusions!
@Leslee – Wow – that’s some perfect astrology – but it must have left a huge hole in your life.
@anonymous – you raise an important point re-in-laws, and again this is a problem I find too. Sibs may be able to work around their problems but once more people get involved it all blows up.
The house for brothers and sisters-in-law is the 9th, which means the sign would be Sag and planet Jupiter. I have not investigated the last two so that is pure speculation. It’s the sort of thing that Vedic astrology deals with very handily.. But now that you mention it, I’m going to make a point of checking.