When someone loves, let’s say, coffee, but for various reasons is unable to enjoy the pleasure of that particular beverage, “delightful” in its specific characteristics, hour by hour the “need” grows for something “similar” with which to substitute it: a surrogate.
So it is in the life of a woman, when, for reasons that lead back to manifest or latent conflicts in a relationship, she is denied physical relations with her husband, she will, perhaps unconsciously, go in search of a substitute: that is, a surrogate. The analyses of the majority of charts show us that there can be many types of surrogate and in some cases we can confirm that the “surrogate” can be the perfect way of revitalising marital relations. One returns, so to speak, to savor again the pleasurable flavour of the “coffee”.
Most common among many motivations that drive a woman to substitute her “coffee” are the following:
lack of understanding between the partners
difficulty conceiving
an authoritarian husband
economic crises or failures
the crisis of the empty nest
However, the most common and important instigator comes from the fact that every woman in her married life sacrifices a part of herself in order to submit herself to the “traditional” role of the wife, defined by the husband because he feels it to be in some way “natural”. The bonds of living together, dictated by matrimony or, these days ever more often, by cohabitation, bestows security on the couple, giving rise to some general mechanisms. The man tries to impose his personality and his needs, while the woman, out of her atavistic fear of abandonment and violence, tries to comply with him in return for a quiet life, thus repressing her own individuality. However, at the moment in which the woman reaches the limits of repression, she rebels and shows her discontent either in an extreme way or by projecting it onto the little things of daily life.
This modus vivendi does not become too burdensome because in the couple’s relationship she has a little space for herself that permits her to hang on to her own personality. But the moment the couple becomes a family she bears the responsibility of holding that family together, thus becoming both mother to her children and mother to her husband: it’s not by chance that it’s at this point that some men start to call their wives “Mom”. The security of the bonds of affection become ever more robust; the man, even if, on the one hand, he feels a little left out because he has to make way for the new arrival, on the other, he feels it is less likely that his wife will leave him or have some suitor, preoccupied as she is with looking after the child, in doing the domestic chores and keeping up her career. As a consequence, the wife, being no longer desired by the husband as a woman, goes from being unsatisfied to being restless, needing to recover her own femininity and inevitably, so as not to “implode” as a person, seeks a surrogate so she can “explode” as a woman.
Examining the birth charts of women who find a substitute coffee, there is a common denominator: the almost total absence of a father or a peripheral or indirect paternal relationship; this would seem of little importance, so rarely is it spoken of, yet it is in fact this grave lack that causes vacillation in the woman’s sense of security in her future relationship with her partner. It is the mother figure that is the unique protagonist in raising the children, with all their qualities and their “faults”, and that is why I refer so often to her in my articles.
Often, I hear it said: “But times have changed …! These days, the husband helps the wife” but this very statement makes clear that the relationship is not one of equals: if someone is a helper, then they are in a dependent position obliged to follow the dictates of the other, who must take on all the responsibility for running things. In times past, when most women were housewives, that situation had some sense since the husband was preoccupied with his work and supporting the family economically, but today, with women going to work, contributing to the family budget, all that is unacceptable.
Why must the woman work more than the man to make the family run smoothly?
The reply is in the laws of a patriarchal society that still exists today and which women find hard to shake off.
In all analyses of birth charts, which gave rise to this research, the thing that is most striking is the similarity of the horoscopic charts of the husband, or partner, and the surrogate. If the husband reveals Pluto in disharmony with Mars or the Moon, in many cases the lover will reveal this aspect too; they have analogous lives, above all in the realm of emotion and sexuality. It’s clear that each one of us follows our own psychological imprint that is acquired during our first experience of affection, that is, with our parents. We’re all individuals, each different from the other, with our feminine side and our masculine side, which is difficult to change during the course of our lives. The real indication of our development is, in fact, the surrogate; when their emotional-sexual characteristics, and therefore certain aspects of their birth chart, are different to those of the husband or partner, then we can be sure that something inside of us has changed.
I shall now refer of the figure of the Husband who is interchangeable with the surrogate, in as much as he is, in his turn, the lover of other women. His character traits derive from an incomplete and immature relationship with his mother, a fractured Moon, and the separation from her becomes problematic, so much so that he tries to substitute her with a companion.
One finds many aspects in his birth chart but the one that occurs most frequently is the Moon in aspect with Neptune, or in Neptune’s houses or signs, such as the ninth house - Sagittarius, the eleventh house - Aquarius, or the twelfth house - Pisces.
The mother figure comes through as misty, ill-defined, moving from moments of extreme sensitivity and affection to moments in which she is receding, above all when she must lay down limits or forbid certain things; she notices him only if she is exasperated by some situation and, precisely for this reason, she reacts in an exaggerated way. As a consequence, the subject becomes used to living with emotional instability and, therefore, when he begins to have a stable relationship, the monotony, the regularity and the security of the relationship restrain him or actually motivate him to stir up his emotions, spurring him on towards the search for new demands and therefore new relationships.
Another aspect that is often found is the Moon in opposition with or aligned with Pluto, conflicts arising from the incomplete acceptance of the subject on the part of the mother figure, which gives rise to a love-hate relationship with the mother, then with all women; he moves from moments of great passion, eroticism and jealousy to moments of rejection and disparagement of the feminine. In most of the cases analysed, this aspect prompts the masculine subject to choose, for his first sexual experience, a much older woman than himself, sometimes twice his age. He thus experiences strong, almost violent passion because his naivety, his simplicity, comes into contact with the experience of a sophisticated woman and this forces him to grow up quickly to achieve equality with his partner. A difficult and stimulating challenge that nurtures a profound sense of his own inferiority to women.
This becomes a complex that drives him to always be in competition with the feminine figure, leaving him eternally unsatisfied by the relationships he establishes with them; frustration that spurs him to continually seek out other women, who must strongly stimulate and excite him, recalling in this way his first experience.
Another aspect that is frequently found in the birth chart of the surrogate is Pluto in opposition to or in alignment with Mars, which engenders in the person’s soul a fear of castration, which shows itself as a fear of penetration, the fear of inadequacy in the fulfilment of sexual relations, a problem that may drive him to sleep with many women, exactly because it is novelty that creates the necessary passion to sustain the sex act. Beyond this, having numerous, brief relationships is a good way of hiding oneself and concealing one’s own inadequacy.
Aries, Scorpio and Gemini are three signs in which Pluto is in his house and exalted, and these three signs are precisely those most represented in the figure of the surrogate. Pre-eminent, naturally, is Aries, with his rip-roaring sexual energy; as soon as he sees the object of his desire, he impulsively charges his prey and deploys all his vigour in capturing her: he’s always by her side, he’ll drive hundreds of kilometres by car to be with her just for five minutes, he seduces her by making her feel unique and indispensable, showering her with attention and gifts. The relationship almost always begins with sex, and affection comes only afterwards. Because of the ardour he uses in the conquest, he can have only one lover at a time, although there are, of course, exceptions, and because of his irrationality and the way he rushes headlong into the relationship, his recklessness eventually comes to light. The opposite occurs when the person belongs to or has strong qualities bound to Scorpio in their birth chart: sexual relationships, which may be multiple, are directed with extreme lucidity and may be concealed for a lifetime. When he is attracted to a woman, he approaches her stealthily, and studies her to try to understand her psychological mechanism in order to conquer her. If the prey is difficult, that only becomes a challenge for him, a greater stimulus to possess her and to achieve that goal, and he will use any means necessary. His tactics are to attract her to himself, only to then push her away, and recapture her again, thereby unleashing his passion, all of which makes the relationship very vibrant, founded on eroticism and sexuality; rarely on affection. For a subject who belongs to or has strong qualities bound to Gemini in their birth chart, courting is the most erotic phase, because he experiences it as a mental game that delights him. Once he sees a woman who attracts him, he immediately approaches her and, like an adolescent, begins to shower her with compliments and sweet nothings, all the more so if there are others present. He follows that up with an invitation to dinner, or the theatre, or a concert, or a picnic, or a bicycle ride; he enjoys talking on any subject from philosophy to the most banal topic. When the woman is conquered and ready to have sex with him, he retreats, unless there are other qualities in his birth chart that support him, such as Pluto bound positively to the Sun or Mars.
But returning to the woman, that is, to SHE who needs a surrogate in order to taste once again the pleasurable flavour of the coffee, we can say that from the astrological point of view the Moon is the real protagonist. Often present in the birth chart will be a scorpion Moon or one bound to Pluto, a Moon in Libra or bound to Saturn.
In cases in which the Moon, which symbolises woman, and her femininity, is bound to Pluto, which represents vital-sexual energy, we find ourselves before a person who has the need to dwell in the creative, the productive, and thus in her sexuality, in the energy of her own libido.
In cases where the Moon is in harmonious aspect (in conjunction, sestile or in trigon) we find before us a tough, creative woman who is ready to fight, to risk everything, to use whatever means are necessary, in silence, hiding every fact or proof, to obtain what she profoundly desires, and often she succeeds in the endeavour. The roots of her conspicuous individuality and her sense of dignity lie in her acceptance of her personality on the part of her mother, who made her feel sure of herself. Her way of seducing a man is innate; her sexuality oozes from her pores, the way she carries herself. When she seeks a surrogate, she lines up her weapons to get herself noticed; she accentuates her sex-appeal, wearing clothes that show the lines of her figure, then she takes on the role of the prey, ready to be hunted, but if she sees that the hunter is giving up, then she’ll move in and provoke him in order to continue the hunt. At the moment she believes herself to be conquered, then she begins a passionate relationship - very intense sex in which she completely lets herself go. Rarely will a partner or surrogate dominate her exactly because her individuality is so strong and deep-rooted.
In HER chart, the triple conjunction of the Moon, Uranus and Pluto occurs in Virgo, the Moon and Pluto in the fifth house, while Uranus is in the fourth house. The triple conjunction is in opposition to Jupiter in Pisces, in the tenth house, and in trigon with Mercury in Capricorn, in the eighth house, and in neutral quincunx to Saturn in the ninth house. We can therefore say that this woman has a strong creative and vital individuality, a little explosive, but controlled and experienced in a subdued way, when daily life tends to be repetitive. She knows, however, how to take advantage of opportunity, is well organised, determined in her decisions, is precise and methodical. This allows her to achieve good results in her studies, to find work that satisfies her, easily picking up languages on her travels, and she quickly succeeds in carving out a good career. Emotionally, she is a little unsatisfied because she finds it difficult to find her kindred spirit. When she meets him, however, all her determination begins to crumble. At around 27, she will have a passionate but fleeting encounter.
He in fact is impeded by the position of Uranus in Virgo, in the tenth house, with Venus in Gemini in the ninth house, which will bestow emotional uncertainty, further accentuated by the position of Venus between the Moon and Saturn and by the opposition of Uranus to the Moon and Saturn, which are found in the fifth house, where the Moon is in Aquarius and Saturn in Pisces. From the aspect formed by the Moon and Venus, one can assume great conflicts between him and the mother figure, and therefore all women. Effectively, his relationship with his mother is one of dependence: he can’t make a decision without her say-so.
SHE however, through her determination gets him to the altar and gains him social prestige and riches, Jupiter in Aries, in the eighth house, in the sixth to the Moon and to Saturn.
With marriage, which was the obvious conclusion for both of them, since both present the Sun in the seventh house, the first problems begin due to the fact that he transfers the role of mother to the wife, with the consequence that their sexual relations become desultory, and, bit by bit as time passes, diminish more and more. Then SHE tries to revitalise her sexual activity with the pretence of having a child, the Moon in conjunction with Pluto and in trigon with Mercury; in this way, she invigorates their sex life but without getting pregnant.
After discovering through various analyses that the husband is the cause of the infertility because his sperm count is low, and weak, they begin, on the advice of a medical specialist, a schedule of sexual activity based on the period of her greatest fecundity. Organisation, schedules, rationality, though fine for HER (Moon in conjunction with Uranus in quincunx to Saturn) only further exasperates the husband, so much so that it induces him to retreat from reality, rejecting sex completely. And thus SHE is driven toward a surrogate.
A casual meeting during a trip and she shakes off the heavy burden of her relations with her husband.
We immediately notice that in the birth chart of the SURROGATE the Sun is in Aries, in the seventh house, like the husband, and, indeed, so is the Moon, situated in Virgo, in the twelfth house, negative to Venus, situated in Pisces, in the sixth house. Also present is the same Ascendant and therefore the same house. In effect, we find ourselves before a person who is also married but because of the importance that he gives to that, it will be difficult to break the legal relationship: an aspect that we also find in the birth chart of HER. The sensitivity and the courting that he employs are the sparks that ignite her femininity, her womanliness.
She is soon attracted by his histrionic, charming and free and easy manner, derived from the trigon of Jupiter with Pluto that gives him his charisma and charm and allows him to be successful with women. But after an intense and overwhelming period of passion and sex, the two are obliged to return to their families. For HER this is traumatic, sufficient to effectively distance the husband creating an invisible barrier that separates them. The husband, Aries, confronted with this new situation, reinvents himself and tries to recover his pre-eminence, immediately beginning to court her and make love to her. In this context, she becomes pregnant; she succeeds in having what she desired. But the contemporaneous relationship has left her with her a secret anxiety, throughout her pregnancy, caused by doubts about the paternity of the child (Mercury in the eighth house, co-significant Scorpio).
In cases where the Moon is in dominant aspect to Pluto (aligned and opposing) we find before us a woman who does not accept her own ‘I’ because she was first rejected by her mother. As a consequence, it’s a relationship laden with conflict between love and hate, between creativity and destruction, that manifests itself in a continuous search for approval and of faith on the woman’s part, compared to the mother figure, almost a blessing, and one that she finds very difficult to have. The extra-marital relationships, of which she feels the need, can become the spark that destroys the marriage or partnership. Her way of seducing the surrogate oscillates between two opposing tendencies depending whether she feels accepted or not. When she comes across a man who attracts her, she starts to take care of the way she looks, perhaps in an exaggerated fashion, because she has never felt beautiful enough, her innate sensuality comes to the fore and she puts herself in a dependent position, that is she hangs on his every word, she allows him to take the initiative, she immediately gives herself to him sexually; but it is she, however, who calls him, who fixes the next appointment, who takes the lead in carnal relations. The moment she feels that the relationship is beginning to wobble, she tries to “serve him” ever more, to shower him with phone calls, while the physical side is left to dwindle until the affair finally ends.
translated by Nick Skidmore
