I was going to comment on this yesterday but found I couldn't. I still can't. Not fully. I can't counter another person's experience with my own. Any observation by a human being of life in process will never be objective. We find the facts that support our experiences and prejudices, and behold, a perfect fit. I can give examples of Mother Love (which I think is a real chemical, biological thing based on my experience), but that doesn't make me a good mother on a day to day level. The day to day stuff is a matter of will, and conscious efforts which don't always succeed.

I know children experience horrors everyday, perpetrated upon them by people they love. I know mothers like yours exist. But - though they may not be rare, neither are they common. Most of us mothers lie somewhere in between Mother Love and Wicked Stepmother.