Cancer New Moon: Nourishment
I’d been meeting with 16-year-old Hannah* for a couple of months when she finally told me the reason she didn’t want to be adopted.
As an adoption recruiter** – Hannah and her three siblings had been in foster care for eight years – it wasn’t uncommon to hear kids say that they weren’t interested in adoption. Moving around so much, and being let down over and over… well, it’s heartbreaking, to say the least. And when you’re a young person, and you allow yourself to trust – and then that trust gets broken, again and again – it can be hard to see a path forward.
For teens in foster care, it's like the heart is a boomerang: tossed out there, just waiting for the day it returns.
The reasons given for not wanting to be adopted often varied. But I knew that figuring out the why would be key to helping Hannah move forward with the idea of “permanency.”
One day as we were eating at a pizza place, I asked Hannah if she could help me understand her reasons for not wanting to be adopted. By that point, we’d had more time together, and she was starting to share more.
Hannah paused. Then she looked out the window and said, “I can’t let myself be adopted. It would be betraying my family a second time.”
“What do you mean by that?” I asked.
“I already betrayed my family once. I can’t do it again.”
“How did you betray them?”
“I was the one who told that abuse was happening. I could deal with it when I was the one being hit. But once he laid a finger on my little sister? No way. That was it. I had to tell a teacher.”
“Oh Hannah…”
“So I’m the reason our family was broken up. If I hadn’t told, we’d still be together.”
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The New Moon on July 28th (9:52pm CT) takes place at 7° Cancer.
New Moons always occur when the Sun and Moon stand together in the sky, urging us to start something fresh. All New Moons begin a 4-week, 6-month, and 2.5-year cycle – so they’re important times for planting seeds for the future.
The water sign of Cancer, represented by the protective crab, finds comfort in its shell, and is related to caretaking, roots, family, home, foundations, safety, emotional security, and parenting. It’s the sign of the mother, or perhaps better said, of the one who most nourished and cared for you.
This deeply emotional Cancer New Moon is also square let’s-feel-this-bigger Jupiter, asking: How were you nurtured, and how can you nurture others? How do you find safety and comfort? Who is your family (or family of choice)? Where do you come from, and where do you belong?
Let’s-take-action Mars and let’s-destroy-things-and-then-rebuild Pluto are also at odds in this chart: Be careful out there. There’s an urge to change things, but this volatile combination can go sideways easily.
Confusing everything is seafarer Neptune in Pisces, at a standstill in the sky and shouting: What are you grieving? What have you lost? How can you soothe your anxiety? What do you believe in, and who or what can you put your faith in? And how can you shore up your connection to the divine (whatever that means for you)?
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Hannah was a brave kid; fiercely protective of her younger sibs, she sought care and support for them – and eventually for herself as well. For although she wasn’t adopted with her siblings, eventually she allowed me to search for an adoptive family for her… and perhaps that was the bravest thing of all.
And at the risk of making teen adoption sound super easy***, Hannah was adopted just before her 18th birthday.
In this ever-changing and turbulent world, it’s easy to feel lost at sea – just like Hannah felt. But this sensitive Cancer New Moon asks you to pause and consider: What can you initiate as you fix your gaze on the horizon, and move toward a point that will bring comfort and nourishment?
Essay and photo ©2022 Jen Braun, JJ Boots Productions LLC
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*Names have been changed to protect privacy.
**To learn more about my past work, visit my About page.
***It’s not!! But if you’re considering adoption, I encourage you to learn more. Find out if your family is a good fit for adoption from foster care. And visit Ampersand Families or AdoptUSKids.
