Migration, trauma, family obligations — these experiences don’t just vanish with time. They leave traces, shaping the way love, loyalty, and fairness flow across generations.
What anthropology shows us
In the 1950s, the anthropologist May Edel studied my paternal family and clan, which resided in Southwestern Uganda. She observed how fairness and reciprocity were embedded in daily life. Marriage was not only about two people but about two families — carefully balanced through bride-price and exchange. Ancestors were not distant memories; they were living presences, sanctioning those who failed in their duties.
Here, love was not private. It was systemic, collective, and accountable.
What psychotherapy discovered
At the same time, Hungarian psychiatrist Ivan Boszormenyi-Nagy was writing Invisible Loyalties. Having fled war and exile, he brought a different language: psychology, therapy, ethics. Yet his insights echoed what Edel had described.
Ivan spoke of invisible ledgers that record debts and entitlements in families. He described the loyalties that bind children to their parents, even in the face of suffering. He named the burden of parentification, when children carry adult responsibilities in the aftermath of loss or migration. And he showed how unresolved injustices create what he called destructive entitlement — the pull to sabotage, over-give, or repeat suffering in an unconscious attempt to balance the family’s books.
What science is uncovering now
Today, modern biology adds another dimension. Studies with Holocaust survivors, refugee families, and mothers under extreme stress show that trauma can leave marks not just in memory but in the body itself. These marks — often called epigenetic changes — can influence how stress is carried into the next generation.
Scientists debate the details; however, the direction is clear: trauma travels. The past can live in our cells as much as in our stories.
Why this matters for us now
Put together, these threads — anthropology, therapy, biology — all point to the same truth: nothing disappears until it is acknowledged. Families, like societies, carry ledgers of love and injustice. When the balance is broken, someone later in the line will carry the cost.
Healing starts when we look, when we listen, and when we give each part of the story its place.
This is the purpose and work of Systemic Constellations. To reveal the hidden loyalties. Name the forgotten ancestors. And, to restore balance so that love can flow again.
If you are ready to restore the flow of love in your family system, join me at my workshop: Love & Other Things
Or book a Discovery Call today