I have come to believe that reactions like your mother's are due to having been terrorized as a child to a degree higher than the terror of rape or verbal threats. I believe that they have been choked or strangled or held under water or their face pushed into feces. No one knows how common this is because it is even more likely to cause amnesia than other forms of abuse. But I think that it will commonly create a person like your mother whose entire being, almost, is submission. I used to be indignant at this submission; now I consider it another symptom.
I have come to believe that reactions like your mother's are due to having been terrorized as a child to a degree higher than the terror of rape or verbal threats. I believe that they have been choked or strangled or held under water or their face pushed into feces. No one knows how common this is because it is even more likely to cause amnesia than other forms of abuse. But I think that it will commonly create a person like your mother whose entire being, almost, is submission. I used to be indignant at this submission; now I consider it another symptom.
Thank you for sharing. Our histories are so complicated.