I wrote a whole novel, but it was mostly a diary entry. What I came away with, 50,000 words later, is a central question:

  
Is it normal for people to scream/yell at each other in a household? 

If so, how often? 

I'm grappling with this a lot. I was raised by someone who is textbook BPD, and a father who was very passive. I haven't been officially diagnosed, but it's been mentioned by a couple therapists, and from my reading, it is not impossible that I may also have BPD. I may also just be a passive pile of oatmeal and let people walk all over me. That's how it feels. 

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I don't rage. I have totally lost my shit on my mom in my life, and screamed at her - but I have also seen people I would personally judge to be completely mentally healthy lose their shit on her, including professionals. 

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My ex-husband, my kid, my students (I taught high school students with behavioral disorders)...I don't even get "screaming mad" at them. But I wonder if that's a coping mechanism, that I talk myself out of anger because my anger was not tolerated growing up, and the only place I still allow it is with my mom, who rages at literally inanimate objects sometimes? That maybe I ended up working with kids who have behavioral disorders because I am so removed from my own emotions in a moment?  

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I live with my mom now, and she says I let my kid walk all over me. I don't think I do. He makes decent grades, his teachers say he's respectful, we are never unkind to each other (though we are sometimes frustrated) - but I don't yell at him when I'm mad at him, and my mom claims this is me letting him get away with shit. 

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ACTUALLY BECKY, he has consequences that simultaneously hurt more and distance him less.  The discipline is supposed to distance him from the mistake, not from me. 

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My mom would scream at me and I'd never actually have any consequence. I hated the yelling - seriously, it was enough to avoid ever making mistakes because it was brutal - but it just taught me that mistakes distance me from my mother. I worked a lot harder on not getting caught. 

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I am not the world's best mother. My kid probably does get away with too much. My mom is constantly telling me I'm setting him up to be a failure because I don't discipline him. 

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tldr just go back to the top - how much screaming is the right amount of screaming? Is there some screaming at kids that needs to be done? My kid is only 12, so we're still in lite mode, and I'm just.