In “Iron John: A Book About Men“, Robert Bly relates an anecdote wherein a friend announced to Carl Jung that he had just won a promotion; Jung responded by saying “that’s terrible, but I’m sure if we all stick together then we’ll get through it,” and conversely, when the same friend announced that they had just lost their job, the eminent Swiss opened a bottle of wine to celebrate the wonderful news. Doesn’t that make you smile? Of course, funny or not, he was really onto something.
One of the concepts that mundane-physicians struggle most desperately with is the reality that everything is as it ought to be; nothing is wrong. How could anything be wrong? We are all exactly where we should be, experiencing exactly what we need to experience and in no discipline is this better demonstrated than in that of astrology.
Allow me to explain.
Astrology relates a map of experience. It is not a map accompanied by directions or imperatives, but, if you like, it is a map of the possible and it does not evaluate rightness or wrongness; rather it simply relates isness. It describes the terrain, the lanes and thoroughfares, the sinkholes and the stiles of your own metaphysical kingdom. You can travel wherever you choose, although you might not be aware of the choosing; rather it is like wandering aimlessly and finding yourself in some place unsought. The only possibility of incorrectness is in deciding that you would rather be somewhere different. The wanderer naturally declines inclines, the down-slope is unawares preferred to the toilsome slope, so to some extent, this principle explains how people become lost.
Regardless though, if astrology describes your inner terrain, there is no question that some are born in a Beirut and others in an Arcadia. It is possible that the bounds of nurture in your nativity are narrow and easily lost; akin to being born into an oasis before striking out into the trackless waste, or that you are born, like Mowgli, into an alien family that preserves you despite your differences, and your challenges are to come later. All things are possible, but, and crucially, we are not all created equal.
Stephen Arroyo wrote about this and it has stayed with me. You cannot judge all people and all efforts with an unwavering benchmark; there cannot be a finishing line in this sense because we are not all born into equal opportunity. It is madness to laud the winner if he was 80 yards closer to the tape than his next competitor at the start. This is astrology, this is why I do not complain, because my own terrain was unforgiving and it cannot be improved through the power of complaint.
So what of that?
I have just passed a dreadful anniversary. On September 17th last it was two years to the day since I last saw my son Joe, and my daughter Ella. They were 15 and 12 years old at the time, although now they are 17 and 14. At the time I was bewildered by their reluctance to communicate with me, my confusion muddled my responses to their rejection. I applied to the courts to try to forward my claim to be allowed to see my children, who of course I loved and missed enormously. I should not have to explain that, but inevitably, it is the kind of rejection which – as I have just said – muddles your responses.
I wrote to them, I texted them, I emailed them and I got no word of reply. Determining that their mother might be intercepting my messages I eventually wrote to them at their schools and almost immediately I received a letter from their mother’s solicitor warning me that if I continued to write to them at school she would take out an injunction forbidding me from contacting them by any means. I was still waiting for a court date so my solicitor recommended that I not rock the boat before the hearing. The wheels of British justice, at least for the unwealthy do move slowly and it was several weeks before we actually got to sit down with the CAFCASS officer. I stated my bewilderment that the children would not communicate with me and my wife explained, amid tears and considerable apparent distress that since our split I had not bothered to contact the children and so they had determined that I did not care about them and as a result they had arrived at a point where they did not love me any more.
They never wanted to see me again.
I was shocked: not so much by her apparent distress – a graduate of the prestigious Italia Conti school of acting and a Sun-Pluto to boot, she was operating well within her range at this stage – but rather by the CAFCASS officer’s apparent acceptance of her word, even though I had documentary evidence of the threats to which I had previously acquiesced. The verdict of the court? That I should be “allowed” to email my children no more than twice a week. Seven and a half months of legal process had given me the right to do what I already had the right to do, but had been coerced into not doing by my wife (and her Mars-Saturn-Pluto mother). I wrote, but of course I did not write twice a week. In my very first email I chatted to my son about how I was moving house. My wife responded by saying that she would be expecting more maintenance from me since I could afford to move home, I did not hear from my son ever again.
About 6 months later I found a post written by my son on his Internet page wherein he mocked his ‘bastard father’ for not even being able to comply with the court’s order that I write to him twice a week. The court of course had made no such order, but through a subtle twist of presentation it had been turned into a test that, since I did not know that this was how it had been portrayed, I had unwittingly failed. My son had concluded that therefore he was correct in his determination that I did not love him.
It has been insufferably painful, as any right thinking person would imagine. I went – overnight – from being a loving and loved father of two children to never seeing them again. Truly akin to a bereavement.
Of course, I have anger, and I struggle with that. I feel that I have been duped, manipulated and deliberately misled by my wife and her mother. They engaged in a process designed to alienate me from my children and they were successful in achieving that aim. But I cannot easily blame them because I understand the motive and I think they were both hurt when I left my wife. Without wishing to look as though I am justifying my actions, I would say that the damaged moral compass that can only point one in these spiteful directions is to blame, but inevitably, the possession of this dark capability was always at the heart of the breakdown of my marriage. I was habitually troubled by my wife’s family’s casual callousness and by her incipient controlling nature; I truly lasted as long as I could, and 20 years is not the endurance-span of an easy-quitter.
Naturally, I was embarrassed and confused, I could not understand how this could happen to me. Alice, my partner of today who is as gentle as my previous experience was not, has witnessed this undoing process first hand, and if not for her support and validation I think I would have ashamedly swept the whole sorry affair under the carpet simply because I was at a loss to adequately explain it. Then I found a book by Dr Richard Warshak and it was a revelation:
“Your ex-spouse is badmouthing you to your children, perhaps even trying to turn them against you. If you handle the situation ineffectively, you could lose your children’s respect-or worse, lose contact with them. The conventional advice is to do nothing, but Dr. Richard Warshak is convinced that this approach is useless and only leaves parents feeling helpless. The damage to children can be considerable-particularly when warring parents enlist children as allies in the battle. “Divorce Poison” is the first book that offers specific advice to protect children from the results of their parents’ animosity. It details how to distinguish different types of criticism, how and why parents manipulate their children, how to detect these maneuvers, and how these practices damage children. Most important, it offers parents powerful strategies to preserve and rebuild loving relationships with their children.”
I discovered the book too late, because my wife’s work was done and I have had to accept that. Of course it was distressing to read about how the process worked and I could point to a carbon-copy process in the situation I had endured with my own children; it was all there.
I was disheartened though when Alice’s ex-husband began to accuse me of having abused my children. Of course, he did not mention the ‘abuse’ word, but he implied that there must be some sinister reason why my children would not communicate with me and he stated baldly that his children were not safe living in the same house as me. We next had to be interviewed at home by Social Services because of his concerns and he tells his children, my wonderful stepsons that I am a “bad man”, that I do “the work of the devil” and many other groundless and ridiculous “concerns” all carefully presented in the guise of the best interests of his children. The cycle of alienation continues. Accusations of implied abuse are one of the key manifestations of an alienation agenda. He wrote to Alice’s solicitor too accusing her of alienation: another clanger actually, because in the majority of cases, the first parent to make an accusation of alienation is the one perpetrating it. For my part I have been careful to only ever make positive and supportive statements to Alice’s boys about their father, because, unlike him, I understand the damage you do to a child’s psyche when you attack the role models that inform fundamental components of future identity. His attacks damage his own children far more than they do me.
But once again, while I cannot condone such behaviour, I do not blame him because in all of these stories of alienation there is a common component: me.
Somewhere in my astrology there is evidently a great deal of grief and pain around the issue of children.
I cannot begin to describe therefore the joy I felt when my son Teddy Dusters was born on August 30th this year. I love Alice’s children of course, but there are complex boundaries and restraints in these situations, these children are not mine and so I tread a fine line because I do not want to overstep an invisible mark and have to therefore field more accusations. I have had to defend myself against so many outrageous charges that it unfortunately makes me painfully aware of how an innocent remark might be (cynically) misinterpreted. Some accusations (like the “fact” that I am a violent heroin addict) are patently ludicrous, but others – like my deliberate abandonment of my children are more insidious. I pay the same amount in child maintenance to my children that I have not seen or even heard from for two years as Alice’s ex-husband does for his children that he sees every second week, but somehow, I am irresponsible, abusive and sinister. Of course, anyone that knows me literally laughs – often explosively, such is the dissonance – when I relay these ‘concerns’ but they become a great deal more threatening when presented to court officers and social workers who have no personal experience of the kind of person that I truly am. So with respect to my own feelings, there is a certain care that I need to exercise in my relationships with these boys who are not mine. Once again, though, it’s harder on them than it is on me, because they do not want such guardedness in their relationship with me. And what hopeful child would?
So, at last, and through all the anguished preamble, I find myself able to enjoy a relationship with my new son, without any requirement for restraint. With the beautiful Teddy there are no agendas, no distortions, no pound of flesh to be delivered, no Shylock greedily licking his lips in anticipation of my torment. It is like walking unencumbered. Here at last, I thought, there would need to be no pain.
Something is not right with Teddy. Alice noticed it a while ago, his eyes wander back and forth, back and forth ceaselessly. He wakes in the morning and his eyes begin their wandering and he becomes agitated, and only a word will calm him. He cries and can only be consoled with physical contact. He does not make eye contact, does not follow movements; his eyes simply move, back and forth, back and forth.
I have a terrible fear that Teddy is blind.
We took him to the doctor and explained. She examined him and nodded gravely. She chose her words carefully, with that guarded seriousness that does not want to proffer or quash hope, “I think we’d better get somebody to have a look at him” she said. We now have to wait for an appointment with a child opthalmologist and we don’t know how long it will take.
Whenever I see my marvellous, amazing, gentle son my heart is squeezed and wrenched with the most powerful, deep and rich concoction of feeling that I cannot even hope to convey. He smiles, but only when he hears the voice of his Mummy or his Daddy and now, faced with this possibility I cannot look at him without this profound rush of heat that engulfs my chest and rushes out to every limb; it is the fiercest, most protective, anguished love. I cannot – if our worst fears are realised – afford to feel sorry for him because I do not want him to have that identity for himself, but I also cannot separate this wish to shield and sustain and support from the rolling, wrenching anguish of having lost my children in the past. There is nothing but pain in this, even if the pain and love are an inseparable potion that infuses me with tremendous protective power; it wrings my heart to its very core and leaves me desperate, hopeful, afraid, crushed and grateful. How can I possibly feel all of those things? I am glad too, glad because whatever he is, it is simply what he is; it is the terrain of his own inner kingdom and how can it be wrong? I simply don’t have the luxury to be able to feel that as a wrongness.
Nothing is wrong with Teddy, he is perfect.
He will always be perfect, whether or not he can see, and naturally, we will maintain the faith that he will be fine and perfectly sighted.
Teddy has the best astrology of anyone that I have ever seen. A fabulously dignified Saturn in Libra sits exactly on the Ascendant and I understand precisely the implication; it is a dignified isolation. The senses so frequently fail with Saturn rising, especially where there is considerable exaltation. I have seen this a few times in the past, and it is a tough message to convey to somebody who is concerned by their dimming apprehension of their environment (which is the very exact sensation of Saturn on the Ascendant of course). In my own nativity I have often pondered Hygeia, the focus of a tee-square (from Sun-Saturn: inherited limitations) conjunct the fixed star Facies, which is the nebula in the face of the Archer; therefore in the constellation Sagittarius but falling at around 8 Capricorn for the purpose of alignment. All nebulae are traditionally linked to the eyes and blindness, primarily because a test of good eyesight in the Roman army was to be able to see that a star was not one but a cluster, and Hygeia in the 3rd focusing both Sun and Saturn does tell a very specific story. My father (Sun-Saturn) gradually lost his eyesight (Facies) too, so that the last few years of his everyday life (3rd house) were made difficult due to his health (Hygeia), to say the least. He did not complain in the slightest, recognising I think that his terrain was difficult and that it could not be improved by the power of complaint, and he responded only by drinking with greater determination and revelling that much more in gentle conversation; quite unsurprisingly.
Remarkable (and yet quite unsurprising) how the same terrain features keep making themselves felt is it not? It is not so much deja-vu as a sense that I have crossed this bridge before, but when I was younger I had no idea where it would lead me. Now at least I have a dim recollection of this vista that will unfold when I reach the other side. It will very likely look like Chiron in Pisces in the 5th opposed by a Virgo Uranus in the 11th. Most of my pain through children has manifested as a result of other people’s ability to rationalise their dispassionate criticisms of me, whether they are true or not – and with Pisces involved, truth is easily distorted through the perfectionist lens of Neptune. My Chiron is conjunct Atropos too, so in a very real sense, things fall apart. That is my kingdom.
Teddy has a grand trine of Sun – Moon (how glorious is that?!) and North Node conjunct the fixed star Facies! And of course, I timed his birth with astonishing precision; he was born in our kitchen, with Juno, our little feisty terrier looking on bewildered and North Node for Teddy is in a 5 minute conjunction with Imum Coeli; it is rather astonishing. His Ascendant is conjunct Vesta and he was born a single pace from the kitchen hearth, where the wood stove burned brightly. I hope and pray that he will see, but what I take comfort from is the message that he will not be especially vulnerable if he cannot, because his parents, and the people of his wider community will always protect him.
And that will be true regardless of how well he can see, because it is mapped in his own magical, marvellous inner kingdom.
And for me?
It is not wrong.
Regardless of any health worries Teddy is blessed with the undying love of both his parents and his siblings, and that is irreplaceable.
I have no comment to make, nor is it my place to do so regarding the horrific situation that you find yourself in with Gabriella and Joseph but I am disgusted at the friends and acquaintances of yours who condoned and even acquiesced in the proceedings.
Best wishes buddy!
Cheers Tony.
I am glad of your words. As somebody who knew my relationship with my kids first hand you’re more qualified than most to have a view.
Take care, and I’ll pop in soon for a chat.
Your account of the difficulties with children are, unfortunately, very familiar to me. I have been supporting my best friend in this world through an extraordinarily similar situation. It can even be worse. In this particular situation, my friend’s step children later revealed that their natural father had in fact been incredibly abusive to all of them including hitting a 14 year old with a hammer….and this lunatic is still fighting for access to his children, which, understandably enough, their mother does not wish to allow until such time as he has proved through therapy and the like that they will be safe with him
In my own case, I am incredibly lucky. My ex wife and I agreed right from the earliest stages of the divorce never to restrict any access to my children and, indeed, I see a lot more of them than many divorced dads. I did have some trouble with being rubbished by my ex wife to my kids – which came to am end when my eldest son pointedly told his mother in front of me ….’Mum, dad never rubbishes you to us…why do you rubbish him to us?’ No problem since.
Of course, as my sons have grown up, I have been asked more and more penetrating questions as to why my marriage to their mother broke up. If you add into the mix that two of my three sons have Aspergers Syndrome albeit not to a severe degree, and the fac that , among other things, this leads them into seeing issues in very black and white terms, you can see that its a complex area to tackle with them constructively while continuing not to rubbish their mother. I have treated it as a useful illustration of the very grown up life lesson that different people viewing the same events will ineveitably have slightly – or even greatly – different perspectives on them and therefore introduced them to the idea of shades of grey and the need to stay removed from highly emotional situations if you wish to try and get an objective viewpoint.
Personally, I suggest that you take much the same stance in any contact you attempt to have with your children. Say something like …Look, the fact is that your mother and I do see things differently to each other. If we hadn’t seen things generally so differently, we probably wouldn’t have got divorced. Divorce is an incredibly emotional time for all concerned and, kids, no one, especially myself, was thinking very clearly at the time because of it. I daresay your mother will be agree that it was a highly charged time and many things were said in anger that would have never come out had we both been a lot calmer. I know it must have been incredibly hard on you guys too. I will ALWAYS love you and just want to be a part of your lives and to explain myself to you. I understand that you may still be angry and have no wish to make things any worse and will therefore leave it up to you to contact me if and when you want to – just please know that I will ALWAYS hope to see one whenever I open my inbox. Love, Dad.
The above may or may not work – but the point is, at their age, they will have had to grow up quickly all through this situation, and you will need to aim on an adult relationship on an adult rather than parental footing. If you consitently present a calm and respectful presentation of yourself to them and their mother keeps getting all emotional and twisted, your kids are, I’m sure, quite capable of working out for themselves where the real problem lies over time.
In short, I would suggest that you take a long term approach and, most especially, communicate on an ADULT footing with them. By which I do NOT mean to imply that you are being childish in any way – but to suggest that you need to see your children as adults if you are to have any success and penetrating this dark situation. Be plain, open and honest, no matter how painful that may be. Lose any idea of ‘I can’t say that, they are kids, they either won’t understand or won’t be able to cope with it.’ They can and they will. Above all..put the ball in their court. Give them the control. If their mother is over controlling, you most certainly mustn’t add to it – and the contrast will strike home with them far more effectively than anything you could say directly anyway. Let them come to you – just keep making it plain that they are welcome IF they want to. Persist with this and sooner or later I guarantee that they’ll work out for themselves that the person preventing them having a Dad is not you, but their mother.
Thanks Mark,
I completely concur and your advice is sound, indeed I have followed this exact approach for the last year or so. Of course I have tried every imaginable approach in the past, and I can only hope that my children one day understand that they are the victims in this situation, much more so than I am, in any case.
Ironically I was drinking a bottle of Old Peculier as I read your message. I keep hankering to go back to the Green Dragon (even if our last visit there ended rather too drunkenly and confusedly).
Take care amigo, and thanks for the words of encouragement.
I am up for a return to the Green Dragon anytime you care to name.
Or the Rose and Crown next year when the weather allows.
Or I am on holiday during the first week of November and spending time with friends would be a nice thing to do if that works for you.
Let me know
Thanks for sharing Teddy’s pictures, he’s a darling.
Hugs and much love to all of you.
Thanks Neeti.
I will write you soon (I know I keep saying that, but I have had a gruelling few months, bear with me.)
xxx
Not a problem, Jeremy. Feel linked to you regardless.
Your son is absolutely gorgeous, warmest congratulations to you and Alice. I’m so very sorry that you have had to endure so much with regards to your children.
Gx
Thanks Gaynor, I know you’ve had your trials too.
I hope all is good with you, thank you for your kind thoughts.
x
Congratulations on the beautiful Teddy! Whatever happens, I am so glad you will have no restrictions on loving this child. My heart goes out to you and to your children Joe and Ella who, as you said, are really the greater victims of this situation that your ex-wife has created. I really really hope and pray that they will soon know the truth that their father loves them so much and misses them so incredibly. I am divorced with a son, who does see his father, but your experience and heartache make me want to do better to help nurture that relationship. I hope for you that the wound will soon be healed, Chiron.
Thank you Catharine. The breakdown of a marriage is always tricky and unquestionably unfortunate, but I am so pleased when I hear tales such as yours because it is heartening when people manage to maintain perspective and not begin the feeble-minded demonisation process that so frequently appears to blight the wounded parties.
Your resolution is perfect, children need to feel positive about all their role models, and fathers are right up there, alongside mothers, creating lifelong templates for expectation and behaviour. Good for you.
Congratulations Jeremy – your new son is adorable! All my best wishes go out to you.
Thank you Tony.
I am thinking that you recently celebrated a 40th birthday? I hope you had a wonderful day.
Next year shall we have an astrologers’ party?
I did yes – party sounds good to me!
Teddy is beautiful…if he cannot see, he will be gifted in some other way…and of course medical advances suggest that his lack of sight may, in the future, be curable. Easy to say of course – you must feel that you have been ‘cursed’ in some way…by your Sun-Pluto ex maybe, who appears to be playing the witch-wicked stepmother in ‘The Sleeping Beauty’ rather well … but of course, you have been ‘blessed’ by Teddy’s presence in your life,not cursed.
In some respects you are lucky that your absent children are older; being teenagers they will soon rebel against the ‘control’ of their mother and she will face the common insult, ‘No wonder my dad left you.’ Do not think for a minute that life will be easy for her; possession, or destruction is all she knows (you have 1st-hand experience of that)…and she will suffer a karmic-kick-back that teaches her that ‘life’ cannot be controlled – as you say, it just ‘is’.
What I would really like to know, is how do Joe and Ella’s charts interact with yours i.e. where are Saturn(I read that as the mother), Pluto (you, the father) and Chiron (rejection by the mother) and similarly, how do your children interact with your ex-wife? Good luck!
Hi Jean,
I agree with everything you say, and she has certainly created a rod for her back, no question. I wouldn’t wish it on her though.
My son Joe has Sun conjunct a very dignified Saturn in Aquarius, thus a weak Sun and a strong Saturn and I always did find it difficult to be close and warm with him. That’s not because of how I felt, he just seemed to respond in that way.
My daughter has Pluto in the 3rd, and I believe that in this she has followed her brother’s lead, Pluto opposes Mercury, and her Sun is in the 8th house, often a clue that the father needs to be given up. When she was born I was naturally concerned by that, in truth I couldn’t imagine going out of her life except through the mortuary, so I imagined an earlier exit. Funny how things remain true regardless. I hope I get them both back, and looking at long-term trends, I would say that it will happen in around 5 years time, certainly there is an upheaval in store for the family group that have alienated me and I can only hope that it is a rebalancing, rather than a cataclysm.
My daughter has Chiron rising in Libra, conjunct my Sun. I don’t doubt that she harbours real anguish at what has happened but fears rejection from the rest of her family if she were to express it. They really are a bunch of bullies, (her grandmother has Mars-Saturn -Pluto, which unless very carefully managed nearly always results in insensitivity, pernicious anger and oppressive reactions to opposition.)
I think it’s an especial shame for my daughter, as she now has a baby brother who I am sure she would adore.
What a beautiful and wonderful child is Teds. And much blessed with such loving parents. Best wishes to all members of your extended families. Truly.
Thanks Sabina, keep sending those good wishes!
Jeremy– it breaks my heart to know you have had such pain. I don’t even know you, but you gave me such hope when you answered my call for help. This situation is totally shitty. All of us can produce numerous examples of our own descent– i found such treasures and insights in that liminal land! You are reaching the territory no man would willingly explore, but those that do so become fully, inescapably, dazzlingly alive. Quit fighting, or keep fighting, both will probably help with your sense of timing! You deserve all the help you need to come to you. What you need always comes to you!
Even if your children will not be able to read them now, write to them often, and save all the letters, because I know they will welcome them eventually. My kids eventually forgave their Dad, though he was violent, and even though I was insane, they have certainly forgiven me. It’s true– they know much more of what is going on, and it is true that they will truly understand the messed-up dynamic with their mother someday. Don’t underestimate your kids, especially yours.
My god Teddy is amazingly incandescent… How lucky you are! I wish i could sniff his head! How fabulous that you have so many blessings (and ‘curses’ that you can work with instead of suffer from).
Stay free in your mind, and be very kind to yourself.
Leslie, what you say is intriguing. I have a very ambiguous relationship with “fighting” (it’s why I wrote the next post about Mars). I remember speaking to Reverend Kusala (the resident monk at the LA meditation centre) about this. He said that being a Buddhist did not mean that you have to take crap from people. The struggle is knowing how hard to fight in defence of your human rights and in not overstepping the boundary between protecting your dignity and becoming an aggressor. As a result I try not aggress, but I don’t always succeed. Having others attempt to impose their controls onto me has been a serious issues over the last two years. I will never stand down and allow that to happen, but by the same token, I can’t coerce others into my perspective either. At the point where (like in this situation) I cannot affect any change I just stay quiet.
I write to my children but I have come to the conclusion that they don’t even receive my emails because I have only ever had one response in two years now, and that was from my wife! By the same token I do not write to them because (quite apart from the fact that I have no means of knowing (short of a 100 mile drive) if they are living in the same house, and I am sure my wife would intercept the letters. I will just wait to see if they eventually want me back in their lives, perhaps when they have left home, who knows?
What I should say though is that I have mourned the loss of my children. It took about 18 months for the hurt to surface, and I sobbed like I haven’t since my dear old Dad died. I have arrived at a sort of damamged equanimity with it all. If I don’t ever see them again I will be okay. Exactly as with a bereavement, I will always feel pain at their “passing” but I can remember the good times, and I won’t stop loving them.
My son Joe was born with a 10 second conjunction of Uranus-Neptune (the so-called indigo conjunction of 1993). I am quite sure that he will come to a realisation at one of those Uranus transits, 21 or 42 I would guess. I also believe that as soon as he comes around, my daughter will too.
Teddy is truly incandescent, I am so glad that you see it. He smells amazing (nearly all the time haha!) He’s the greatest person I’ve ever met.
Take care
Jeremy, you have no idea how much my heart was breaking while reading this post. While the eloquence of your words and the profundity of your descriptions felt so nostalgic and familiar, each sentence was laced with an unbearable discomfort. Learning about your split a few years ago saddened me so much, because I always thought you guys were such a beautiful, inspiring family. I could see the love and adoration you had for your children in every photo you took of them. I always thought they were so lucky to have you as a dad.
It really kills me to read what has become of your relationship with them, and how it has been so horribly sabotaged. I am happy to see that you have a new son with Alice — he is beautiful. Whether or not he is blind, I know that he is in the best hands with you as his father. I love that you describe his terrain as a dignified isolation. He is symbolic and beautiful and it makes me want to cry.
I don’t want to sit here weeping in your comments, but my heart is reaching out to you, Alice, and Teddy so much.
<3
Kelley
Thank you so much Kel, I’m so glad that you’ve responded to this.
As somebody who has know me for many years it’s heartening to have the truth said aloud from another’s perspective. So much of my experience over the last two years has been clouded with the confusion of rejection and whilst knowing that I did not deserve this (and nor did my children) is a fact that I have always understood, I have nonetheless struggled to find the words to help others understand it. What I have learned is that honesty and openness is the only antidote to that uncertainty.
Teddy is fabulous as you say; I mean really fabulous, I love him so much.
We took him to the childrens’ hospital on Thursday evening where a paediatric doctor echoed the concerns of the two doctors he has seen already, so now we have to wait for an appointment with an opthalmologist. Hopefully that will take place within 3-4 weeks then we should know something. Funny though, I don’t really mind now what the result is; we just have to make the best of it, but if – by some miracle – it is just a developmental problem (which can happen) we will feel so blessed. He smiles so often just at the sound of our voices, it’s magic!
Take care my dear x
What a heartfelt sharing, I was so moved reading your post. Your son Teddy is a magnificent expression of pure Beauty and Love! I wish you and your family a sweet reconciliation, I have no doubt it will happen. In the meantime, the heart breaks open…
Thank you.
Thank you Mary, sincerely.
Oh man, I don’t really know how to respond. It really pains me to see you having to go through this Divorce Poison (as the book is so adequately titled). It is obvious that this behaviour has no protective value and is only designed to punish you. And with the sort of punishment that is close to unbearable, and both parties know that. I have been used in such role when my father was punishing my mother during their divorce by denying her contact and whatnot. Fortunately I always knew that my father was a notorious liar and emotional abuser so it didn’t do any lasting harm. Hopefully your relationship with your children will still recover.
I have no knowledge on how your marriage looked like, I’m an outsider, but I’ve met you a couple of times and claiming that you don’t love your children and don’t want to have contact with them is just… bizarre. But as always you are an inspiration, maintaining a positive outlook on life. I still have the book on panic attacks that you gave me and re-read it from time to time. I hope they are not troubling you but if you ever need it back I can mail it to you.
Teddy looks just awesome! I am rooting for him and hoping that you get good news form the doctor. But regardless, he has the best thing a child can have, a pair of loving parents 🙂
Stay strong, friend! You are one of the people that contributed to my betterment so if I can contribute to improving your mood, just poke me 🙂
Thanks my good friend, and I have the same hopes and fears as you. Having heard your stories of your situation, well, selfish people do not think about the effects of their actions on others, but (and this I can only hope) you can still turn out to be a good guy, as you have. I hope the same for my children of course.
When are you next visiting the UK? It was great to see you last year and we will have to do that again, although I know it is our turn to visit you, we promised that we would, but then there were babies… On that subject there has been a big improvement with Teddy, he can definitely see, so long as you are very, very close to his eyes! We are hoping it is just a slow development now, although we haven’t had an appointment for the eye doctor as yet. We will get over to Stockholm soon I promise.
As for the book, it is a good thing, sensitive types like us have these problems. Hang on to it and pass it along when that day comes when you find some other soul that is struggling. Thanks for your constant support and friendship.
Not sure when I’m gonna be in UK next time but I usually visit every year, not always the London area, though. But if I do, I’ll make sure to email you 🙂
Yay for Teddy! 😀
Jeremy
Teddy is a lucky boy to have a father like you. He is such a cute boy. Welcome back! Love, Kelly
Thank you my dear Kelly. I sincerely hope you are doing well.
You’ve been on my mind quite a bit lately and I thought your bundle should have arrived by now. He is absolutely beautiful, Congratulations to you and Alice. You know I will be sending as much positivity as I have your way regarding his diagnosis and prognosis. I do however think that if in fact he is blind that he was born to the right family. You are the kind of father who will make the world right for him whether he can see it or not. I know you well enough to be sure of that. I also know you well enough to know that the mud that’s been thrown at you is pure bunk. There is not a neglectful or abusive cell in your body. I firmly believe that.
I can’t believe it’s been two years already. *sigh* I am sorry J, you didn’t deserve this. What happened was between you and her and the kids should never have been used as tools with which to punish you. I hold out hope that one day they discover the truth and find their way back to you.
I looked at the photos of Teddy on your other site and I have to tell you, he might not be able to see but I can see wisdom in those little eyes. He knows more than he’s saying 🙂
Please keep me informed as to how things go with the doctors. I’m thinking of all of you. And one day when you have some time I’d love to catch up properly, it’s been too long my friend.
Much love,
B
Ben, I feel terrible; I have no excuse for not having caught up with you for all this time. As I have just remarked to Luke, Teddy is not without sight, but he is at least very short-sighted. I will email you when we know something. As another person who has known me for many years now, I am naturally encouraged to hear from you.
Of course all of these attacks on me are simply justification for the hideous acts of emotional abuse that my wife (yes, we are still married, she doesn’t want me to know my children, but for some reason she doesn’t want to divorce me either…) has visited on her own children. I don’t want to be, but I am angry about it. Parental alienation is a recognised form of emotional abuse of course and the children in these scenarios have to deal with a spectrum of mental and emotional problems in later life. Most never recover to the extent where they can enjoy healthy and fulfilling relationships of their own, simply because they are irrevocably damaged by this experience. As for Alice’s ex-husband, he is a pretty unpleasant character in my experience and he feels it is okay to resort to a baseless campaign of slander and innuendo simply to damage my reputation with the social services and anyone else who will listen. What I do know is that one day he’s not going to be very proud of the way he has behaved either, but that’s what happens when you have no code, and no underlying perspective on what life is for or how the system works. It’s not his fault, it’s just his level. Which I realise will sound patronising, but it’s only a statement of fact. I don’t yet have the grace to be more generous about him.
Naturally, it is a tricky position to find oneself in. I have had to let my children go and I have mourned them, if you like. Of course I will be glad if they come back into my life, but I have accepted that I may never see them again. I read a wonderful book by Byron Katie recently, I respect her so much, and she has this particular perspective on difficulty. You have to ask yourself if any challenging statement is true for you. I ask myself if it was wrong for me to have lost my children in this way. From a very subjective perspective I can say that it feels that it was, but at another level entirely I cannot be certain that it was wrong. It is just their path and mine. Viewed from that vantage point what is wrong? It just is. There is so much pain because of it; but who can say that I was not meant to experience it. I don’t want to sound off-kilter, but it cracked my heart open, all of this. It made everything so clear and I have been deepened and stretched and tempered by it. Teddy is a new sense of a child for me, he is a force in me, like gravity. That is the best that I can explain it. Now I know that what I need to do is extrapolate that power from him and me to everyone else in my life who I care about. Somewhere in between losing Joe and Ella and finding Teddy, I learned to love properly. I am very unpractised at it just now, but I hope to get better.
All of which doesn’t mean of course that I have to put up with bullies, manipulators and tyrants. That is a new challenge too. Right now, I just want to value my friends; I have so many good friends, all across the world, I wish you were closer.
So, I’ve said all of that and I’m not even drunk! Next stop Canada, and we will get drunk!
Take care my dear Ben, say hi to your husband and your marvellous son who has promised to have the Canadian Air Force fly me over for a visit when he is Prime Minister.
Jx
Best of luck, Jeremy. I lost your blog a long time ago, and I’m sad to find that now that I finally found you again you’re in this much pain.
However I’m pleased that now Teddy is there to love you and to be loved by you.
Hi Ann-Mi, it’s great to hear from you again after all these years, how is Finland? We will catch up soon. Thanks for your kind thoughts, Jx
He’s absolutely beautiful:)
My son has Vesta on the Asc and Saturn in the 1st – we thought there was something wrong with his eyes the first few weeks, but it came out ok. Then the health visitor thought there was something wrong with his hearing, but that turned out ok too.
Keep the faith, and blessings on you all.
Thanks Opal, it’s a very hopeful message you have written here. We think it may be something similar but we will know more at the end of this month, fingers crossed. Take care.
Teddy looks amazing – Just read your post, the power of your sharing is profound, I find myself continually having to expand to take in the depth of pain & love that you have expressed. We”re sending all our love and wishes for the best outcome for you, Alice & Teddy.
Love Nina, marek & Maia x
Hello Nina, I will email you very soon (I have twelve million emails to write just now), Alice and I were talking about you last night and discussing what an awesome person you are. Let’s get together soon all of us.
J xx
Teddy is lovely! My very best wishes to you all. The laws of Spirit are strange and not for us to judge probably. Don’t underestimate your children, our children’s future is not ours; not ours to control or judge or be judged by. Though the pain is almost unbearable for parents who feel rejected by their children (I do know this), it is not the same for the child. They start with the Karmas they have chosen and by the laws of Spirit are equipped to grow through them. This is in no way meant to cause you further pain but it’s simply not your problem. Let the future take care of itself, today you have a bright little soul and a gentle wife – Be brave and be happy. Love Morvah
Thanks Morvah.
I agree! Take care, and I fully accept that it might not be ‘wrong’. It is painful though.
Jeremy:
I am crying right now for you. This piece of writing was a gift of love for Teddy and a gift of love for all of us. You are always and will ever be, truly gifted. And blessed.
And you know something: this might sound odd but you sound better. Much happier. Through that pain, even so; happier. Something is different, something most excellent you might not quite know yet.
Much love to you
Hey Jor,
You’re a great person and I value your ongoing and unfaltering support. I am happier, things are moving fast with me and I am making a difficult commitment to personal integrity right now which is making all sorts of effects in my life. It’s very freeing, but also quite unnerving.
And now, having made that admission I am concerned that it might be interpreted negatively, so (not for you) I shall expalin that by personal integrity, I mean a commitment to doing what is right regardless of the actions of others, regardless of the threat to me and mindful, of course, of the hateful trap of brutal honesty, which so many seem to think is where ‘integrity’ lies. Honesty within myself, not just telling it like it is. 🙂
Hi there jem, just read your post and although I may not understand all the astrology, I can feel the love surrounding your beautiful new bundle, and for the rest of the house hold. I know he and you are in the right place now! Just for your info I have and will continue to send absent healing to you and teddy, it seems to be a good channel and I hope it helps. As for your other children, all the other far more educated readers have said what I feel, they will come back eventually you just have to play the waiting game and make sure they know they’re always welcome. I think thats all you can do. I send you and yours heaps of love annie
Hi lovely Annie.
We miss you and I am so glad of your incredible gift. We need to see you soon!
Jem xxx
you’re a powerful, wise and compassionate man, jeremy. it’s truly wonderful to have found you.
Hygeia on Neptune brought me here today Dec 8/12 to read this story. I lost my children too at 12 and 16. I would phone and hear the warmth in my sister in laws home wrenching my guts,12th house full. I knew my ex. would one day claim them back with his money. I knew it’d draw them. I didn’t fully realize my son’s values would be “family” ones and that’s my husbands side. Every Christmas I get left on my own. Now pluto has progressed to my fourth.
But my ex had an aneurism in mid forties and has spent his time in a private care home. He’s suffered too. His second wife left too after the seizure and his son from that marriage lives in England not Canada. However, the blame goes on still today. The wound is still raw. I regret leaving and I blame my sister in law, the other one, for her interference (such an emotional time yes) and yet it was close to the saturn return and that’s when I met my yoga teacher so perhaps it was meant to be. In my floundering, she rescued me. After that, my daughter I let go for her own best interests and it worked out excellent. My son was another story and a mistake I never forget but he is coping well and has two girls himself 8 – 10 and you can imagine the rejection I am experiencing with her mom taking most all of it and the jealous manipulations to frame me a certain way and perhaps sensitize me to my son’s jealousy and kids as pawns in power games. Lots of suffering but finding that non dual space and listening to you explain why it’s not wrong eases things. My chiron is fifth conj. black moon Lilith. Right now today though it’s hygeia, chiron and neptune and hearing another’s story.
So best of luck, hope it turned out well – Sweet as babies are Teddy is. Walking down a country quiet road you know that it just IS. Thank you for posting. Very unlike other postings. Bless.