I have set up my own family of origin and the family I married into.
A constellation is a way to set up the family and watch the dynamic between family members. It is best done with people who stand in as proxy for family members. The proxy members take on the personalities of the actual family members. They will say phrases and act in a way the family members, whom they represent, would. It is eerily fascinating. To get an idea of the concept of a family constellation, here are a couple of YouTube videos to help get the picture.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oU0dLG947w
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZ1oYiR5VpM
We have done a family constellation early in our marriage because I could not get my MEM to see that I have no place in his life. When he set us up he put me far behind him and his mother on the place where the wife would usually be. The lady standing in for his mother said she could immediately feel a hatred for me and really really wanted to punch me in the face. Imagine the relief I felt that someone validated my feelings. My MEM felt overwhelmed and said it was all weird stuff that had nothing to do with anything. He even went so far to tell his mother about the weird things I try to do to frame her and she laughed and assured him that taking good care of mom is honoring his parents and that I just want to try to separate them because I am jealous that I don't have a good relationship with my mother, who passed away decades ago. He, having been trained for decades to believe all she says, believed she has his best interest at heart and he is being a good son by being completely under her control. Not much changed after that family constellation, my MEM wasn't ready to see reality. It took years for him of distance before he could see dysfunction. He now realizes how his mother manipulates and his father is a narcissist.
We recently started having trouble with one of our children. He kept being aggressive towards me, calling me names, and disobeying all the time. He has a real tender and kind heart and I couldn't figure out what happened. He would say things like, you just hate grandma but she is such a good person and you don't want to see it. I want to see grandma, you just make her out to be such a mean person. And on and on and on it went. Finally we wrestled it out. We were seriously wrestling and while I had a good hold of him and he is screaming the most insulting names at me, my training as a family constellation assistant finally kicked in. I did not get mad at all because I realized he is not himself, he is speaking for someone else. I told him that he is a child, he is just a child. I said take all your troubles and all the responsibilities you carry right now from grandma and give it back to her. I said picture her and bring it to her, hand it to her and tell her you are just a child and you are no longer working for her. You are a child and all the problem she has and the hatred and anger she needs to keep, you will leave her in love, grateful that she gave life to your dad and now, please look friendly on me and my family.
As soon as I started going down the right track he settled down, he relaxed. I said I demanded an apology for all the things he called me. I didn't get it right away, he asked to take a bath. We were both sweating from our serious wrestle, this kid is all muscle and I kept thinking how nice it is that I weigh more than I probably should because that is all I have to still control him. He took a bath, walked out and apologized for all the things he called me. A complete different person, the person he was meant to be, kind, loving, generous, and polite, simply with a good heart. The way he acted wasn't himself at all and I was so grateful to have had training in the family constellation to finally realize it. Because he is such a kind person, he was easily manipulated by his grandparents to become their spokesperson against me, giving them a place in our family even though they are destructive.
I also realized that I need to do better in sending out better energy towards them to discourage my children from unconsciously feeling they need to step in and give them a place. My children are securely attached and therefore have big hearts, see the needs of others and are willing to help. They are easy targets for those in the family whom we won't allow into the family because of their willingness to help. Until I became a facilitator in the family constellation I didn't realize that our oldest daughter was in that place as well. She spoke for grandma, defended grandma, was loyal to grandma even though grandma never did anything for her. Before leaving for Europe our oldest daughter visited grandma and was surprised that grandma didn't care. After talking to her for 3-5 minutes she turned to her MEM son and ignored our daughter for the rest of the 2-3 hour visit. Our daughter had brought a book she was able to read while wondering why grandma plays the loving grandma when in reality she doesn't give a hoot about her grand kids, all talk but no actions. She only cares about herself and her one and only enmeshed son.
Thus family constellation can bring some underlying unhealthy dynamics into the open where they can no longer be denied by all parties. It can help in understanding unusual out of character behavior of one of the children and even animals at times.