I have had issues with my mother since my childhood. I have seen the dirty murky side of parental bullying, name shaming, beating etc. This continued till my school graduation. Mind you, since all this is pretty common in the indian parenting style, i thought things would change when i became an adult because i rarely saw adults in these types of fights with their parents. Well, i was wrong. This continued well into my adult life and i had no where to go. Since a few years, i have reflected, and changed my approach on how to deal with her. i started talking to her after my father expired and since our family is going through a troubling times. She had since not been aggressive or abusive. Today, however, I got into a verbal fight with her that brought me back to the reality that no matter how much i mature, she is always going to be the same. Mind you, I am not innocent either. I do say things in anger but i am rarely scathing oy abusive in approach, tone or implication of words. I heard today what i had been hearing all my life- the words, stupid, idiot, the threats, the implication that my life is doomed because nobody likes a back talking daughter in law and that my time will come. I was again that child, that fearful thing who just couldnt compete in winning the argument with a grown person wishing that she would just stop. Just stop. She is loud enough that the people downstairs would have surely heard her. Who,by the way have kids my exact age, so the fact that i am still called all these names at 24 makes me feel so much shame. Any self esteem that i try to instil gets crashed by the thought of people hearing her and i am not sure if icould even talk normally to them the next time i see them. This takes me back to a time when these days were everyday and i was always at fault. How do you deal with a person like that. How do you deal with a parent like that. For people who will say, boundaries, let me tell you, i have tried. Apparently no matter how much i grow up, she always has a way of reducing me to a crying, pathetic mess. Shame hits different when you are an adult being shouted at like a child,