Healing Generational Trauma Through Family Constellation Therapy: A Conversation with Blanka Molnar

Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen

Publication (Outlet/Website): A Further Inquiry

Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2025/07/16

Blanka Molnar is a Houston-based holistic therapist and certified family constellation® practitioner. As the founder of Awarenest and a conscious parenting coach, Molnar explores multigenerational trauma, emotional regulation, and the challenges of parent-child relationships across cultures. Drawing from personal experience and professional expertise, she discusses how inherited trauma can shape behaviour, why boundaries are vital, and how family constellation® therapy helps uncover and heal generational wounds. Molnar emphasizes the importance of individual responsibility, self-awareness, and culturally sensitive approaches in fostering inner healing, especially for families navigating complex emotional dynamics.

Scott Douglas Jacobsen: So today, we’re here with Blanka Molnar. She’s a Houston-based therapist, certified family constellation® practitioner, and the founder of Awarenest. As a conscious parenting coach, she specializes in helping families heal multigenerational trauma and support neurodivergent children through systemic constellation® work, meditation, and practical tools. Her work empowers parents to foster emotional intelligence, intentional parenting, and inner healing, with a focus on ADHD, emotional regulation, and spirited children.

Blanka offers transformative coaching that combines mindfulness with developmental and somatic insights. An immigrant mother and small business owner, she advocates for gentle, conscious parenting and supports multicultural families in navigating complex emotional dynamics with compassion and clarity. Thank you for joining me today. So, what are some of the common reasons a once-close parent-child bond becomes strained in adulthood?

Blanka Molnar: Good question. Each of us must forge our path. Sometimes, that journey requires distance from our family—whether physical or emotional—to find our voice and identity truly.

As I often say, I love stories and fairy tales where the hero must leave home, face their dragons, and walk alone through the unknown. This metaphor holds meaning in both my personal and professional life.

I left my home country, Hungary, and was the first in my family to graduate with a degree in economics. But after working in the corporate world, I decided to leave that behind. I moved to the United States to work as an au pair, caring for children and, in many ways, starting over. It was part of a larger journey—to heal not only personal wounds but also inherited trauma.

These weren’t just family patterns. I grew up in Hungary, which, although never officially part of the USSR, was a satellite state of the Soviet Union under communist rule until the late 1980s. I was five years old when the Berlin Wall fell in 1989—a pivotal moment in the collapse of Eastern Bloc communism. The legacy of that era included scarcity, generational pain, and a deep cultural imprint of survival and silence.

I believed that walking my path independently, even if it meant being alone for a time, would help me heal. And it did. I spent years doing deep personal work—what I call “peeling the onion,” layer by layer, filter by filter—until I could rediscover who I truly was underneath inherited stories.

I never entirely cut ties with my family, but I did put an ocean between us. That distance—the Pacific, in this case—gave me the space I needed. The nine-hour time difference made regular communication less frequent, which allowed me to focus inward and process deeply.

Now, when I visit or we talk, I’m coming from a more grounded and authentic place. I’m not speaking from anger or old pain. I’ve processed much of that. Through the practice of family constellation®, I’ve been able to see my family from a new perspective and gain a deeper understanding of their struggles. This work has helped me offer compassion—not only to clients but also to my parents.

I’ve cried, I’ve laughed, I’ve processed years of pain and joy. And today, I feel more whole. My parents still know how to push my buttons—many of us experience that—but the triggers are fewer. I no longer react the way I once did. That’s the gift of doing the inner work.

Jacobsen: So this is, long story short, that you sometimes need much healing—even if you believe your childhood was amazing and your parents stayed together. You still have to find your inner strength. When your parents are either too perfect or far from ideal, it cannot be easy to develop that strength in their presence. Sometimes, you have to step away—to abandon them, in a sense—so you can eventually return to the relationship from a more authentic and grounded part of yourself. What about unresolved childhood dynamics and their impact on the multigenerational child-parent relationship? That’s the concept of multigenerational trauma.

Molnar: Yes, this is a more nontraditional way of understanding human development, and it comes from my experience with family constellation® therapy.

Sometimes, when a child’s behaviour or attitude suddenly changes—especially over a short period—it may signal that an unresolved trauma or emotional wound has been activated. This trauma may not even originate from their own life. It can be something inherited from generations past—what we call transgenerational or multigenerational trauma.

For example, you might inherit trauma from your great-grandmother—something she experienced that was never spoken about or processed. That trauma can remain dormant for decades, only to be triggered when you reach a certain age or life milestone. Let’s say you turn 35, and something traumatic happened to an ancestor at the same age. Or you’re trying to start a family and struggling with fertility, and that activates emotional patterns passed down through seven generations. Family constellation® work can trace these patterns back up to seven generations.

It can also show up in everyday experiences—such as starting a new job and suddenly feeling like your buttons are being pushed in unexpected ways. Beneath that reaction, there may be a deeper, inherited wound at play. The challenge is that we rarely have detailed knowledge about what happened five or seven generations ago. If we’re lucky, we may know a bit about our great-grandparents—but rarely beyond that.

That’s where healing through holistic approaches, such as family constellation® work, becomes powerful. It gets to the root. And when parents begin to heal those hidden wounds, their children often begin to heal too—because the emotional legacy is no longer being unconsciously passed on.

Jacobsen: When a parent feels hurt, rejected, or confused because their adult child has withdrawn, how can the parent respond without criticism or defensiveness?

Molnar: That’s a tough one. I’m a parent myself, and I’ve also done that to my parents. So I’m right in the middle—I know both sides. It’s not easy.

In an ideal world surrounded by self-aware and emotionally conscious parents, we would not take it personally. But real life is more complicated. Still, I believe this: we’re all here to bring our lessons, and sometimes we need distance to teach them.

If it resonates with you, consider that we bring experiences or karmic patterns from past lives. Even if you don’t believe in past lives, you can see that each person comes into this life with specific lessons to learn. So, when a child withdraws, it is often not about the parent at all. It is about the child finding their way and resolving their inner journey.

The best response a parent can give is patience, presence, and a willingness to stay open—without assuming blame or trying to fix it. That allows for reconnection to occur in a more genuine and healing manner.

Yes, maybe how the parents raised the child contributed to the dynamic—but it is not entirely their fault. As parents, we often try to fix our children or take responsibility for them. Sometimes, the reverse happens—children end up taking responsibility for their parents.

But what we have to recognize, especially when we’re talking about adult children, is that each person must take responsibility for themselves. You cannot fix your child. You cannot live their life for them.

So, in an ideal situation—where you can step back—you recognize that this is not about you. It is about them. You can say, “Hey, I love you unconditionally for who you are, even when you make mistakes. But I will take a step back. If you fall, I will be here to catch you. But I respect your choices, your decisions, and your life.”

That is the greatest gift you can offer them. And it is also one of the most painful because it is so much easier to try to fix someone or fix a situation than to step back and say, “You know what? I trust your strength. I trust that you can handle this.”

Jacobsen: What about communication strategies—something positive, affirming, assertive—to allow for honest dialogue, without offence, about how a child may be feeling and how a parent may be feeling in those situations?

Molnar: As a parent, you can express yourself honestly. You can say, “Yes, this hurts me. Your choices right now are painful for me.” You can acknowledge that. Say, “I’m your parent. I raised you. We went through so much together.”

But again, if your child pulling away doesn’t trigger something unresolved in you—like an abandonment wound or a loss of identity, especially in single-parent homes—it is easier to communicate from a grounded, centred place.

This does not mean suppressing your feelings. It means not adding emotional intensity that clouds understanding. You can say, “Yes, this hurts, but I want to understand you.” One thing I often suggest to my clients is saying, “I need time.”

You do not need to respond, ideally in the moment. You can say, “I need to process this. I may need to meditate on it. I may need to journal. Right now, I’m in pain, and I don’t want to speak or act from this place of pain. But give me a few days, and let’s come back to this conversation.”

Pausing and asking for time is one of the healthiest communication tools—especially when emotions are high.

Jacobsen: And what about children setting boundaries? It doesn’t necessarily have to be across the Pacific Ocean.

Molnar: [Laughing] Yes, funny enough, I learned that it does not always work. You can put a whole ocean between you, and your emotional baggage will still come with you.

In my case, I recreated the same emotional dynamics across the ocean—. The same issues came up. I tried to escape them, but it didn’t work. That’s when I realized that healing must come from within.

So, yes—setting boundaries with parents can be difficult, especially depending on their and the children’s personalities . But it is necessary. Boundaries are not about cutting people off; they are about creating the space you need to grow. It’s about respecting yourselves and others. And eventually, that can strengthen the relationship.

That’s why I see so many clients who say, “No, I’ve completely cut my parents out of my life—and I don’t want to go back.” And if that’s how you feel right now, I understand. But I don’t typically recommend that to my clients. Whether we’re conscious of it or not, we receive energetic support, strength, and psychological grounding from our parents—even when the relationship is strained or complicated.

When you completely shut them out of your life, it can feel like trying to fly a jet without its engines. If you cut off your mother, it’s like flying with one engine down. If you cut off your father, the other one is gone. You’re trying to spread your wings and soar but without foundational support.

So, instead of full disconnection, I encourage people to seek support—through therapy, holistic healing, journaling, or any modality that resonates. But also suggest to, ask yourself your why. That why will carry you through difficult moments. Why do you want to create distance? Why do you feel the need to fly to the other side of the world? Why are you putting emotional space between you and your parents? What are you trying to heal?

And you can communicate that. You can say, “I love you—or I’m not sure how I feel right now—but I need healing. This isn’t about you. This is something I need to do for myself.”

That is a more constructive way to express your boundaries. It avoids blame or finger-pointing. You’re not saying, “Because of you, I’m like this,” or, “You’re responsible for how I grew up.” Instead, you’re stepping into adult responsibility and saying, “This is my decision. Right now, I need space. That might mean I do not call you for a while. It might mean I move to Asia, rent a little scooter, and go on a personal journey to rediscover my voice.”

You can always return to the message: “This is about me. This is for my healing, my peace of mind, my future.”

Jacobsen: What are some everyday situations that North Americans face in their family dynamics—especially points of tension? And does that differ from what you experienced growing up in Hungary?

Molnar: Yes and no. When I was born, Hungary was experiencing financial instability. And my family, like many others, was also struggling financially. So there was a sense of limitation—not just economically, but emotionally and culturally. What Americans had access to in the 1970s and 1980s—choices, variety, mobility—we didn’t.

You had different brands of soda and different types of jeans. We had one pair of jeans. When my father was finally allowed to travel to Austria and brought back gummy bears or other sweets, it was a huge event. That was expensive. It was rare. And it was tied to a sense of scarcity.

So yes, the values we grew up with were different—shaped by restriction and survival. We were raised with a mindset of limitation. But what I see in the U.S. now—especially among younger generations—is a different kind of challenge.

It’s not a matter of scarcity but a generational reckoning. Many young people feel that something in the previous generations did not work, and they are determined to change it. There’s a collective sense of, “This ends with us.” That’s something I see echoed across cultures now—Hungarian, American, and elsewhere. The language is different, but the need to break cycles and create something healthier is universal.

You can even see it reflected in popular media—new movies, new series—with titles like It Ends with Us. There’s a growing awareness that generational cycles of pain—especially abuse, narcissistic dynamics, and unhealthy parenting patterns—must stop.

A few pain points I see repeatedly include narcissistic personalities, entitlement, and overprotection. There’s a helicopter-style parenting approach where children are highly protected and provided for, which on the surface seems loving—and it is—but it can have unintended consequences. Children may struggle to find their voice to develop independence and resilience, especially when they’ve never had to navigate life without constant parental oversight.

So yes, there are overlapping issues globally—trauma, control, disconnection—but the specifics can differ based on the country’s economic and cultural context.

Jacobsen: Typically, do cultural dynamics place more strain on family relationships than individual personalities and interactions? For example, someone growing up in the Democratic Republic of the Congo might experience the influence of poverty more directly than someone in the United States. But in both cases, could the individual parent-child relationship still be the primary factor in emotional strain, regardless of the broader context?

Molnar: Again, I’d say both. Culture and individual dynamics are deeply intertwined.

From my experience growing up in Hungary and now living and working in the United States, I’ve seen how culture influences parenting. The U.S. is an individualistic country. That’s a vast cultural difference. It shows up in how we raise children. In times of crisis—like hurricanes or other disasters—Americans come together. But day-to-day life? It’s very much finding your way, being self-sufficient, and standing out.

Parents here often feel pressure to push their children to excel very early. Kids are enrolled in piano and swimming lessons at the age of two. By age four, they’re expected to be preparing for their SATs! [Laughing] It is intense. Such a culture fosters high expectations and competitiveness.

By contrast, many Asian cultures, for example, are more community-oriented and place stronger emphasis on respect for elders and family roles. In Hungary, we were raised with a very different mindset—one shaped by historical suppression and economic instability.

But even within each culture, family inheritance plays a considerable role. What trauma did the family carry? Were they descended from enslaved people, refugees, or those living in systemic poverty? Did their family endure war or genocide? These things shape us, even if they happened generations ago.

And we can’t talk about culture without acknowledging historical trauma. Hungary has been under occupation and suppression repeatedly—under the Ottomans, then as part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, then under Soviet rule. These layers of control left deep cultural scars. It’s no surprise that finding one’s voice and asserting autonomy remains difficult for many Hungarians.

The U.S. has its parallel legacy—slavery, Indigenous genocide, war, systemic racism. World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War—these events profoundly shaped families and cultural norms here. Those inherited traumas are still present, even if not openly acknowledged.

So, while culture lays the foundation, individual family systems—how those broader patterns get passed down—ultimately shape the parent-child dynamic. Healing happens when we address both.

Jacobsen: When you work with a client, at what point do you find responsible termination of the client-therapist relationship is appropriate? In other words, what are some deep signals that a person is sufficiently recentered and ready to go forward into their life independently—that they have the tools and are good to go?

Molnar: That’s a great question. In most cases, the decision is in the hands of the client. They determine how many sessions they need and when they feel they have completed them.

Family constellation® work is not a traditional form of therapy. It’s not like being in therapy for four years and attending sessions weekly or biweekly. Sometimes, it’s a one-time experience. A client might come in and say, “I have this specific issue, and I want to resolve it.” And after one session, they feel a fundamental shift and say, “I’m fine now.” That’s valid.

When that happens, I usually follow up with them—checking in two to three weeks later to see how they’re integrating the experience.

Other clients come in with a series of interconnected issues—let’s say abuse, cancer or war-related trauma. Because those types of traumas can stem from both sides of the family, and it’s often layered, one session won’t be enough. In those cases, clients might commit to four, five, or six sessions. And each time, we go deeper.

But we can only go as deep as the soul allows in any given session. Sometimes, something needs to settle or heal over the following weeks before we can move to the next layer of the onion. So, the pacing is very intuitive and client-led.

I always tell them, “If you feel called to continue, reach out. If you want to go deeper into a specific topic, I’m here.” But ultimately, they know. They feel that more work is needed.

And yes, there have been cases where a client completed six sessions and then disappeared—ghosted, as people say. That’s okay, too. It’s not like traditional therapy because it works at the root level. Some people get what they came for and move on. I never push.

For others, they come back when they’re ready to work on another layer—whether it’s relationships, financial patterns, or self-worth. The family constellation® opens that door, and they decide whether or not to walk through it again.

Jacobsen: What therapeutic method, when dealing with family dynamics, has the most evidence behind it? Of course, there are established, authoritative models—modalities that are backed by research and applied based on the practitioner’s training and the client’s needs. But across the board, what tends to be effective for most family contexts?

Molnar: That depends heavily on the person—their personality, their openness, and their life circumstances.

Traditional therapy, including cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT), is still the most widely used and researched. It’s also the most accessible—it’s covered by insurance, which makes a significant difference for many people. Finances play a substantial role in determining the type of therapy someone chooses.

Family constellation®, on the other hand, is less known in the U.S. It originated in Germany and is much more popular in parts of Europe and South America. Many people here have never heard of it.

I’ll be honest—I’m not familiar with every therapy model out there, and I don’t try to pretend otherwise. I don’t like to claim that one method is objectively better than another. It depends on what works for you.

I tried several modalities. For me, the family constellation® resonated with my soul. It took me down to the roots of my issues and then helped lift me back up. I spent two and a half years in traditional therapy, but I always felt like I was scratching the surface when it came to family dynamics.

That’s why I emphasize finding what works for you. What brings clarity, emotional release, and integration? That’s what matters most.

Jacobsen: When it comes to background checks—not in terms of criminal history but in terms of credentials and qualifications—what should someone do before starting therapy? How can they make sure the therapist is appropriate and adequately trained and that the treatment offered is legitimate?

Molnar: I always recommend doing some research. Check reviews if you can—Google reviews, therapist directories, or, if you’re going through insurance, look at their provider network. Many platforms also offer client feedback and credentials.

But beyond reviews, I highly recommend having a conversation with the therapist before starting sessions. That initial conversation is key. You need to feel aligned with the therapist’s energy, values, and communication style. Therapy is a profoundly personal journey, and if the connection doesn’t feel right from the start, the work won’t be as practical as it could be.

Jacobsen: Right, no need to go too deep into ethics codes or licensure requirements—most laypeople need to confirm credentials and have a sense of whether the person is trustworthy and professional.

Molnar: That’s usually enough for most people to make an informed choice.

Jacobsen: What’s one of your favourite quotes related to family therapy?

Molnar: One that changed my life is from Carl Jung: “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life, and you will call it fate.”

That’s how I see family constellation® work. You’re living on autopilot until you bring those invisible family bonds and inherited issues into the light. Once you do, you can finally choose your path with awareness.

Jacobsen: A classic therapist move—Jung, Frankl, Nietzsche! [Laughing]

Molnar: Always! [Laughing] It’s true, though—we all go back to them for a reason.

Jacobsen: I’m out of questions, Blanka. Thank you so much for your time today. I appreciate your expertise—it was a pleasure to meet you.

Molnar: Thank you, Scott. It was lovely to be here and to have this conversation. I appreciate the platform.

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