Do you believe that a mental illness can be found in a natal chart?

We are predisposed toward certain mental illnesses if the parents have these mental illnesses. Since I have had depression, my child knows that she might be predisposed to depression at some time in her life.

However, my father had depression but we children were never told of his depression. I always wondered why he would stay in his dark bedroom for days at a time. I really worried about him because I didn't know what was wrong. How I wish I would have been told about his trouble with depression because when I had depression I had no idea what was wrong with me! I knew something was seriously wrong but had no idea what 'depression' even was.

So yes indeed genetics plays a part in mental illness and substance abuse too.

However astrology can be of help here too. Mercury is how we think and if our Mercury is tough aspected (conjunction, square, opposition) with other planets then this can give us some information regarding mental illness.

I have Mercury square Neptune which can be very 'screwed up' in how I see the world. My father had Sun opposition Neptune and I believe this made his nature (sun) very unrealistic and filled with delusion (neptune) and these were issues that confused him. And his father was an alcoholic so my father was predisposed genetically toward alcoholism but didn't drink because of what alcohol did to his family.

I think that many things create issues for us in our lifetime. Someone asked me once who created man? I said our creator. And he said, "God creates us but Man makes us." How true. Our upbringing does make or break us and for those predisposed with mental illness genetically should be told instead of 'hiding' it behind closed doors.

In the 20th Century things like mental illness were 'hidden' from others. Thank goodness this 21st Century has 'opened' the door on so many issues that used to be hidden and filled with shame. From sexual abuse to domestic abuse to mental illness to homosexuality for goodness sake!!! Everything was hidden that wasn't "right." I am so grateful that these things are 'out of the closet' because there is no shame in any of these things.

So astrologically I think that Mercury (how we think), Sun (our nature), Moon (our emotions) that have the hard aspects of conjunction, square, and opposition can incline us to suffer from mental illness. And many with mental illness often have substance abuse problems (neptune) in order to 'forget' about their mental issues.

I hope this is helpful to you. I am so grateful we can openly speak about anything in this day and age because when I was young people with mental illness were institutionalized and the 'family' just acted as if they didn't exist. How heartwrenchingly sad.

Wonderful question. Good luck and bless you too.

not quite. but if a person has a mental illness, you might be able to guess which one it is based on their chart. but you can't look and say oh i see this configuration here, these adverse aspects in these signs and houses oh total bipolar disorder. nope. two people could have practically the exact same chart, one of them could be quite mentally ill, the other not. but like for depression or bipolar, look for an afflicted moon. for ocd look for a poorly placed mars, something in virgo and scorpio. of course people with any of this could have a full blown mental illness or just have some difficulties like any old one. it depends upon not just genetics and upbringing, but the individual person's soul i think.

it is gene and bio-chemical imbalance not when you're born.

I think both. I like astrology but I don't think it's something you should live by.

I've thought about this a lot. I've looked at charts of people who are obviously "off," e.g. Ted Bundy and Charles Manson, and while there are difficulties in these charts, they don't seem to rise to the level or sink to the level of the natives' behavior.

It might be possible to indicate mental health problems that have a physical origin, e.g. brain damage. We might see threats of injuries to the head for example. Emotional problems are not as easy to spot and to my knowledge there is nothing in the literature to indicate this. We all have emotional problems at some level. The question would be how to sort out the more difficult ones or the ones more likely to manifest dramatically.

Bundy is my cross to bear. The things he did without provocation to thoroughly decent young women are unspeakable. His chart is striking is that almost everything is not only below the horizon, but near the IC the lowest point in the chart. But the planets bunch together now and then and many people are born with the bunch crowding around all the different angles, and yet there is only one Ted Bundy. So the bunching up at the bottom of the chart might be a red flag - nothing more.

Mercury, in Bundy's chart, the natural place to look, is retrograde (no serious problem) in Scorpio disposed by Mars in Sagittarius. It is not combust or even under the beams. Mercury is also conjunct (4+ degrees) a seriously debilitated Venus (in detriment and retrograde), making Mercury an accidental malefic along with Venus. The Moon, the other part of our mind, is in Sagittarius a little more than 4 degrees from Mars, and rules the 12th house. This could be significant, but I'm not sure how. I see these all as red flags, but nothing that shows the monster he became. It might be there. I can't find it.

http://webspace.webring.com/people/ld/dada1/astro.html

Yes, I believe it can SOMEWHAT show whether or not someone has a mental disorder/mental illness. I've had OCD my entire life and though it has calmed down as I've gotten older, I still have my moments every now and then. I'm a Sagittarius and my third house is near the end (27°) Virgo. My pluto (19°) Libra is also in my third house. Having pluto (the planet of intensity and obsession) in the third house (communication, ideas) = obsessive compulsive disorder, if not obsessive tendencies, and having it in Virgo makes it a bit worse since Virgo tends to worry and must have everything neat and perfect in it's proper place. OCD, and other anxiety conditions, also run in my dad's side of the family. So I'd say a combination of genetics + aspects similar to the ones I've listed.

Try a picses moon. Not mentally ill, but early sensitive to everything

powers of planets doesn't make things happen "magically" (no, no i'm not going to bash astrology, relax) things still happen for a physical reason.

it's not like, planets align in a certain way and create madness in your brain without physical / hormonal / genetic / whatever reasons.

so when you ask is it planets or some physical reason, you are assuming planet says ocuspocus and phantasmal terror suddenly conquer your mind and then you feel like killing bunch of people?

of course there are reasons.

will this spesific single egg and this spesific single sperm will combine and make the same person each time? i think it's a bit like throwing the same dice but sometimes getting 6:6 and sometimes getting 1:6. so, is that luck? is there such a thing like luck? i think we just name what we don't truly understand as luck.

if you were to throw that die again, the same angle, the same height, the exact same momentum, you would always get same number. so that even not luck.

but who is throwing the die? and why in that way?

yes, there's always a reason but no, all the reasons can not be physical. because then you would need reasons for reasons and it would be an endless loop and for those who love physical realism endless is not a good thing. there should be axiomatic forces. they are what they are and without reason. maybe planets are those forces. maybe not, but you need something to kick start all that soulless mechanical parts and those starters can not be soulless mechanical parts themselves. they should be something really different.