Natal Pluto in the 4th house/Pluto conjunct IC: Breaking the Family Curse
Photo: Pia Paulina Guilmoth
Pluto in the 4th house may indicate family or home instability, power dynamics, or generally undesirable situations in early life, but above all else, 4th house Pluto is about “breaking generational curses” and putting an end to toxic family patterns, the kinds of harmful family patterns, beliefs, and behaviors that have been passed down for generations.
Pluto in the 4th house and Pluto conjunct the IC are being included together in this article. These placements show up in more or less the same ways.
Pluto in astrology
Pluto in astrology represents extremes, instability, change, depth, deep roots (especially roots of the psychological variety), truth, secrets, hidden things, power dynamics, fear, anxiety, abuse, generational curse-breaking, intensity, and profound insight. This does not mean that all of these themes will show up in every person’s Pluto story, but these are all possibilities.
4th house and IC in astrology
The 4th house & the IC sit at the very bottom of the chart and deal with roots of all kinds – family of origin, lineage and ancestry, the deep roots of our psychological programming, childhood experiences – as well as your physical home and the past in general. The 4th house and IC are like the roots of the tree of your life, and the soil they grow in.
Natal Pluto in the 4th house or Natal Pluto conjunct the IC
4th house Pluto is the Pluto placement that is most intrinsically tied to breaking generational curses. Over the years I’ve found that Pluto represents breaking generational curses in everyone’s chart, but because the 4th house represents family, early life, roots, and ancestral lineage, few people are called to breaking family curses like people with Pluto in the 4th house are. What that “generational curse” is varies wildly from person to person.
It’s worth mentioning that some people with Pluto in the 4th house will not successfully put an end to whatever their Pluto represents before they have children and they will “pass down” this placement to one or more of their kids. This does not mean you’ve failed, nor does it mean that you’re doomed to traumatize your children. It means that you are still exploring, and now you can work together to explore your family’s history. Be open to learning from your child.
Pluto in the 4th house can manifest as instability within your physical home — everything from literally damaged foundations, moving house frequently, or disinterest in putting down roots.
A quick Google search for ‘Pluto in the 4th house’ is kind of scary – the search results paint a picture of a childhood wrought with abuse, control, power dynamics, and intense instability. While Pluto in the 4th house may come with a difficult childhood, this is not always the case. And perhaps even more importantly, in the vast majority of real-life cases, natal 4th house Pluto shows up in much more subtle ways.
That being said, some 4th house Pluto people have experienced profound trauma or abuse early on in life. The nature of this trauma or abuse may be physical, sexual, psychological, emotional, financial, health-related, death-related… the list goes on.
Some people with Pluto in the 4th have witnessed or experienced strange power dynamics or people attempting to wield power or control over them or other people.
Others, still, are made to keep secrets within their family, or they find out later in life that strange (and often major) secrets were kept from them and that something in their childhood or their family line was actually not at all what they thought it was. Perhaps you come from a long line of people who were secretive and simply not open with one another. The possibilities are endless, but these are some of the most common scenarios. Pluto in the 4th seems to show up most frequently as family secrets.
Pluto in the 4th house can also indicate a family with strong ties to or interest in the occult.
Healing 4th house Pluto
Pluto in the 4th house people have a way of talking about traumatic childhood experiences (if they’ve had ‘em!) that feels strangely detached, almost like maybe they don’t quite recognize how strange or painful or awful their experiences actually were. It just feels very normal to them, and that’s the thing about any planet in the 4th house: the vibe of that planet was very much normalized very early on in life. For people with Pluto in the 4th house, the upheaval, darkness, secretiveness, or general ~intensity~ of Pluto just feels normal.
Working with Pluto in the 4th house begins with gently but viscerally, somatically acknowledging that what you experienced was traumatic, and while it was your normal, it should not have been and does not have to continue to be. We tap into the most positive expression of Pluto when we stare the truth right in the eye and choose change. 4th house Pluto means staring the truth of one’s early life or longer-term family history in the eye and choosing not to continue the pattern, committing to change. Let the ways of the past end with you.