Solunars by Aldebaran Sidereal Academy

Dr. Millard wrote:It was with great pity and a sense of guilt that I studied the record: "The woman was an obese eighteen year old, dull looking but seeming to understand. She was in a wheelchair. The chief complaint is of fecal incontinence secondary to her long previous history of paraplegia. She enters hospital to have a colostomy."

Gayle was born with a meningomyelocele. The lower end of the spinal cord, from which arise the nerves supplying the bladder, bowel, and legs, was exposed in a sack, and covered only with a thin layer of skin. (Neural tube defects can now be diagnosed in pregnancy by a blood test on the mother, and by a test of the amniotic fluid.)

In the old days, the sac always began to leak spinal fluid and became infected. Then the child died of meningitis.

About twenty years ago, surgery had become sufficiently advanced to be able to operate on these children. The nerves in the sac can be freed and covered with skin. The children then lived, because they did not become infected, and even the most 'successful' cases developed hydrocephalus and mental retardation.

When Gayle was born, this complication was well recognized, and to prevent it, a shunt was constructed to take away excess fluid from the ventricles of the brain. In her case, the left kidney was removed and the shunt placed in the left ureter.

The technique has improved, and now it is placed in the atrium of the heart. The excess fluid passes into the circulation... However, Gayle was born before this method was introduced. Her developing hydrocephalus was arrested, and though a "slow learner," she definitely was not retarded. She seemed a normal nine year old, although desperately ill when she entered hospital with E. coli meningitis, which had then reached the brain from a urinary tract infection on November 17, 1967.

It seemed that she would probably die. Meningitis alone is a potentially fatal disease, but meningitis in the presence of a brain to ureter shunt is impossible cure without removing the shunt, which acts as a foreign body. Antibiotic treatment began at once, but despite this, the pressure in the brain was very great and kept increasing. The blood pressure rose with it, in order to maintain the flow of blood through the brain. It reached the incredible height of 300/200, and we had called in a neurosurgeon to put a pressure monitor in her skull when she suddenly herniated her brainstem through the foramen magnum and sank into a very deep coma. She was totally paralyzed, both arms and legs, and death seemed but hours away.

It was the weekend. I was on duty and sat with her. She was bleeding into her stomach and into her skin, lungs, and b rain. Unless the blood pressure could be reduced, she would bleed to death. I started [various drugs] but none brought it down. As a last resort, I put up an Arfonad drip... to dilate the blood vessels which were in spasm and keeping her pressure as high. She was insensitive to it, but I sat with her through the night and monitored her. Little by little the bleeding ceased and so she lived.

I never thought she would be paralyzed. Her arms gradually returned to normal, but her legs never moved again.

After her blood pressure and intracranial pressure had stabilized, and her kidney function, which temporarily had ceased, returned, she was taken to the operating room and the shunt was removed. The meningitis slowly cleared.

I do not know how much her brain was damaged, and whether it was due to the meningitis or the high pressure. She seemed much more retarded after her illness. Her family could not cope with looking after her in a wheelchair, and she was sent to an institution for retarded children where she remained for several years.

The legs used to go into intolerably painful muscle spasms. As cordotomy was done... to cut the nerves in the spinal cord. She was incontinent of urine, so her bladder was removed and her ureters diverted into the bowel. Then she was incontinent of faeces, so a colostomy was carried out in April 1977.

She had a nervous breakdown and was in the psych ward in the summer of 1976. She must have insight int her condition, for people who are very retarded to not have acute psychotic episodes.

I have seen her once since then. She was in a wheelchair, and she did not remember her illness. Since then, she has seen more doctors than one can count, and her treatment must have run into thousands of [1970s] dollars. Worse than that is the thought as to the kind of future she has to look forward to.

• Born with a meningomyelocele (lower end of spinal cord exposed in a sack, covered only with a thin layer of skin).
• Surgical intervention covered the exposed nerves with skin, then, to avoid deadly consequences, constructed a shunt to drain excess fluid from the brain. For this, one kidney was removed and the shunt placed in the freed ureter.
• Reduced mental capacity, but not severe initially. (It worsened after the major crises described.)
• At age 9, a urinary tract infection reached the brain. She became "desperately ill." During this, there were severe secondary effects including extremely high blood pressure causing profuse internal bleeding everywhere and herniated the brain stem, producing "very deep coma" and total paralysis.
• Treatment resolved the meningitis and resolved the immediate crisis.
• Intercranial pressure and blood pressure shut down her kidneys temporarily, but this returned. later. Coming out of this, she regained upper extremity mobility but not her legs. Some further brain damage resulted. Later surgeries resulted in bladder removal (thus u8rinary incontinence), bowel incontinence (thus a colostomy), and a later nervous breakdown while institutionalized. Constrained to a wheel chair.

• Sun is remotely background but well-aspected with a partile square to Jupiter; therefore vitality isn't great, but has extra protection (e.g., good heart health, many functions working very well),
• Moon in Gemini refers to the legs (and theoretically to the nerves: both lights are in Gemini).
• Mars in Aries is primarily connected to the kidneys-bladder, uterus, buttocks-bowel.
• Acutely foreground Venus-Saturn opposition (Taurus-Scorpio) dominates the chart and has its usual meanings. I could see this spilling over into explicit health matters just because it dominates everything, but it seems it did not - an important observation. None of the typical Venus-Saturn health concerns resulted despite the huge set of system breakdowns.
• No background hard aspects, but quite a few middleground mundane aspects exist, more important because they involve Moon and Mars which are always important for illness.
• Mundanely, Mars opposes a Jupiter-Neptune conjunction, all square Moon. The oppositions occur across Libra-Aries, with Moon in Gemini. Also, a moderate Mercury-Uranus conjunction (mundo).

Jim Eshelman wrote: Thu May 25, 2023 12:27 pm The big concerns, then, are in Gemini and Aries parts of the body, and the Moon-Mars-Neptune (+ some Jupiter) mundane T-square and maybe the Mercury-Uranus conjunction. These are the main things we have to work with, and they do a really good job of describing the weakest and most afflicted body parts and functions (including most of the secondary and tertiary effects).

• Moon-Mars: Bleeding, fever, inflammation, infection, dehydration. Tissue engorgement.
• Moon-Neptune: Fluid disturbances. Blood impurities. Edema.
• Mars-Jupiter: Healthy muscular system, energy, strength. Other problems expected that didn't appear or were not reported here.
• Mars-Neptune: Illness in general. Toxic or infectious agents; increased sensitivity to chemicals, allergens, foods, or infection. Muscular atrophy, weakness, paralysis. Painful edema.

Dr. Millard wrote: ...desperately ill when she entered hospital with E. coli meningitis, which had then reached the brain from a urinary tract infection on November 17, 1967.

By secondary progressions, her natal Aries-Libra infection potential also became ripe, probably setting off the whole pattern:
6°52' Can - p Sun
7°49' Ari - p Mars
7°51' Lib - r Neptune

Mars-Neptune contacts should be given particular considerations in cases of illness as it often characteristic of an infection from outside or a type of auto-toxin which in severe cases can lead to death if the body has not been freed of the toxin early on.

Venus_Daily wrote: Tue May 30, 2023 12:59 pm It's odd how before I got into Sideral astrology, I always knew I had a heavy Venusian/Lunar influence, but it wasn't until I became more familiar with mundane aspects that it was really explained.