Saturn in parent-child relationships

[Avshalom Binyamin]

Looking at my daughter's synastry with me and her mom, I found a few interesting things. Aside from all the expected affectionate, familial aspects, there are also a couple challenging ones.

(1) I have my Saturn closely opposite her Mars. Energetically, I experience her as pretty high energy, impatient and grabby, and I'm often trying to redirect (or less ideally, dampen her physicality).
(2) I also have my Mercury conjunct her Saturn. So, no matter how many times I say, "honey, please don't grab me/the cat/her classmate," she will always continue to grab me/the cat/her classmate.

On her mom's side of things, I see

(1) daughter's Saturn is conjunct mom's Mars, which (a) trines daughter's Neptune, (b) trines her Mercury
(c) sextiles her Pluto. Sometimes the spoiling is a little unhealthy, and, ironically, sets up daughter for criticism and conflict from mom.
(2) daughter's Saturn squares mom's Sun.

It's not my business to manage their relationship.

I want to see instead how I can best help within my relationship with her. It seems like the central challenge of my relationship is to see how I can redirect her Martial energies in a way that doesn't squash them.

Dad: October 8, 1980, 12:00noon El Cajon, CA
Mom: August 1, 1967, 8:15am Rockledge, FL
Daughter: March 15, 2013, 5:57pm Portland, OR

Dad aspects to Daughter
Sun square Pluto (5 deg) - I'm in awe of her and she transforms me
Moon square Pluto (1 deg) - I'm in awe of her
Moon trine Jupiter (3 deg) - I spoil her a bit
Moon opposite Uranus (5 deg) - we have lots of fun together
Mercury conjunct Saturn (0 deg) - she doesn't listen to me
Mercury sextile Pluto (0 deg) - lots of quiet time, but when we do talk, we talk about weird stuff
Mercury opposite Moon (4 deg) - good communication, I learn from her
Venus opposite Neptune (1 deg) - easy to forgive each other for small stuff
Venus opposite Mercury (1 deg) - I love listening to her
Venus square MC (2 deg) - unconditional parental love
Venus square Jupiter (5 deg) - more spoiling
Mars trine Sun (3 deg) - me encouraging her on her life path
Mars trine Mars (5 deg) - we're super competitive: "race you to the house!"
Jupiter opposite Sun (1 deg) - deep mutual respect
Jupiter opposite Venus (4 deg) - still more spoiling
Saturn opposite Mars (2 deg) - me dampening her aggressive side?
Uranus trine Sun (1 deg) - lots of fun together
Uranus trine Venus (2 deg) - bonding in spite of generation gap
Neptune square Venus (2 deg) - easy to forgive each other for small stuff
Neptune square Sun (5 deg) - I overreact to her a bit?
IC conjunct Uranus (2 deg) - she pushes me to new interesting stuff
IC conjunct Mars (2 deg) - lots of physicality - she's always wrestling with and grabbing me
AC square Venus (2 deg) - unconditional family love
AC square Sun (5 deg) - she tries to boss me around

Mom aspects to Daughter
Sun sextile Jupiter (0 deg) - deep mutual respect
Sun trine Uranus (2 deg) - lots of fun together
Sun square Saturn (2 deg) - painful limitations, hard to let go of
Moon conjunct Jupiter (3 deg) - she spoils her a bit
Moon sextile Uranus (5 deg) - lots of fun together
Moon square AC (1 deg) - motherly protective
Mercury sextile Moon (4 deg) - good communication
Mercury trine Venus (3 deg) - she loves listening to her mom
Venus conjunct AC (2 deg) - unconditional parental love
Venus sextile Saturn (2 deg) - daughter putting limits on mom affection
Venus trine Pluto (2 deg) - distance between daughter and mom affection
Venus square Jupiter (4 deg) - more spoiling
Venus trine Moon (2 deg) - lots of affection
Mars conjunct Saturn (4 deg) - power struggles
Mars trine Mercury (2 deg) - argumentative
Mars trine Neptune (3 deg) - unhealthy spoiling
Mars sextile Pluto (4 deg) - conflict
Jupiter square Moon (1 deg) - more spoiling
Uranus opposite Venus (0 deg) - generation gap bonding
Uranus opposite Sun (3 deg) - lots of fun together
Neptune trine Venus (0 deg) - forgive the small stuff
Neptune trine Sun (3 deg) - mom overreacts to her a bit?
Pluto opposite Venus (3 deg) - very close?
Pluto trine Moon (4 deg) - daughter in awe of mom

Dad's transits to Daughter (Portland location)
Uranus trine Venus
Saturn opposite Mars
Jupiter opposite Sun
Venus opposite Neptune
Venus opposite Mercury
Mercury conjunct Saturn
Moon opposite Mars

I see this as: I'm an exciting and fun dad, but in the context of that we butt heads over me limiting/redirecting her impulsive/creative drives. Still, it's a positive relationship that honors her core. In that context, we communicate freely and easily, even if I'm a bit indulgent. Sometimes, we get serious about learning, and it can get intense.

Mom's transits to Daughter (Portland location)
Neptune trine Venus
Uranus opposite Venus
Jupiter square Moon
Mars trine Mercury
Moon conjunct MC
Moon square Mercury

I see this as: She has a deep sentimental relationship with her mom, who is also an exciting and fun mom, who honors her emotional core. In that context, they have conflict and touchiness.

[Mike V]

Thank you for sharing this. This is one of the first synastric analyses where I felt like I had any comprehension of what was being presented!

[Jim Eshelman]

Here's how I see the basic relationship. (One needs to see all those individual trees you isolated - all very interesting BTW - but also the forest.)

DAUGHTER experiences DAD especially through his New Moon square her Pluto, his Venus on her EP (opposite her Mercury-Neptune), his Jupiter opposite her Sun-Venus, and his Saturn opposite her Mars. Primarily he loves her and is her dear friend and playmate and companion in fantasy adventure - that part is loud and clear. He also controls and contains her and (whether he's like this or not) there's a sense on her part that he should be struggling with her more. There seems something inherent in their relationship that he will go - won't remain - but the nature of the aspects is most likely in the form that he won't remain as she now knows him. Though she probably isn't wise enough to grasp this directly, there is a truth sitting right out in the open of their relationship: That within the certainty of this love, this relationship should be tough and hardening, that there should be power struggles to test her (and she, of course, would come out on top in the end ). - This is reasonably consistent with what her natal chart says about the way she would experience her father or father-figures: Her chart doesn't show one who would have a "father complex," but who would experience paternal authority mostly in a loving way aside from the expected growing-pain crises of her own emerging autonomy. Her Saturn is weakly placed, but does have a partile octile to Sun - father isn't missing - but really is otherwise unaspected except for the sextile from Pluto.

DAD experiences DAUGHTER primarily through her Mars-Uranus conjunction on his IC (the Mars opposite his Saturn) and her Moon opposite his Mercury. Through her Venus closely square his Ascendant and her Sun-Venus opposite his Jupiter. Through her Saturn on his Mercury and her Pluto square his New Moon. She adores him and terrifies him and changes him, layer by layer. He, too, sees that they are great friends and playmates, and sometimes wonders where he found so amazing friend. But oh, can she upset his apple cart and spill his well-settled table, and it stings his Virgo soul most how often she seems not to listen to him (and warms his Virgo soul most that she, regardless, is constantly his eager pupil, though often it seems the other way around).

Or something like that.

[Jim Eshelman]

With Mom, the first thing I want to mention is that Portland was never going to be her "happy place" on Earth. Saturn is on her MC (with its Sun and Jupiter aspects), and her Vertex system pulls Moon mundanely to the Antivertex and Pluto to the Northpoint. It was never going to be the place for the family her Moon-Venus wanted, but the one that a (quasi) Moon on 1st, Pluto on 4th would deliver.

DAUGHTER experiences MOM through Mom's Sun square her Saturn but Moon on her culminating Jupiter; through Mom's Venus on her Ascendant and Jupiter square her Moon; and through Mom's Mars widely conjunct her Saturn, and Saturn square her Pluto. In some ways, this is simpler on the surface than the Dad picture: There is pure love and unwavering caretaking coexisting with almost edgy-stern discipline. There is something in a Sun-Saturn interchange that causes the Saturn person (Daughter) to look deep into the shadow pits of her (D's) soul. This is probably a generational hand-off, a transmission of "women's wisdom" as Mom holds it. The affection is deep and reciprocal, and generally this seems more the parent who is The Parent, where Dad seems more the parent who is The Companion.

Daughter has more of a Mother Complex (in the classic sense) than a Father Complex. Moon's opposite to Saturn is a defining aspect of Daughter's chart, and, when it stretches to Moon opposite Saturn and both aspecting Pluto - with Moon in the immediate background - there is a bit of "mother deprivation," of feeling her absent or withheld. There's enough "merger" juice in D's chart (angular Neptune, general connector-planets dominant, Sun in Venus' exaltation and Neptune's home, conjunct Venus) that this perception of absence will be one of the strong factors that shapes her. There's no blame here - probably no misbehavior, because D picked a horoscope that would have her experience primary maternal figures this way. It's just one of the formative factors for her to navigate.

MOM experiences DAUGHTER through D's Sun and (especially) Venus opposite her Uranus, Jupiter conjunct her Moon (and widely square her Venus), and Saturn widely conjunct her Mars. This is quite good! She experiences her as a joy and a blessing and, between them, there is an ongoing sense that things are always new and rarely dull.

Or something like that.

[Jim Eshelman]

A bit of karma: Mars-Uranus straddling the other's IC is what Dad brought to Mom, and now is the experience that Daughter turns around and brings to Dad. Interesting.

[Avshalom Binyamin]

Yes it is all interesting and rings true.

Portland was one of two life goal destinations for mom, but indeed, it has been a Saturnine experience for her. I see she has only Saturn angular in Portland. In Orange county, where her mom and extended family live, she also has angular Venus and Pluto.

Annabelle has Jupiter angular in both, though it looks like Venus edges into foreground in Orange County.

I feel my natal Neptune stronger in so cal. Here in Portland I get Neptune eased off and more Jupiter, so I enjoy it here more.

But part of my life goal now is to become location independent career wise over the next decade, so that their are more workable options.