what kind of mom
What kind of mom would go off and leave her 8 year old daughter?
shareworse, she left like 6 kids there
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MovieChat Forums > Where the Crawdads Sing (2022) Discussion > what kind of mom
Unfortunately, the movie really glosses over large sections of the book. In the book, the abuse the kids and the mother suffered at the hands of the father was brutal. It's a much longer section of the book than what the movie portrayed.
In the movie, the father is shown punching their mother once and knocking her to the ground. In the book, the beatings go on for months and years. And it's not just the mother. The kids are badly beaten as well. For example, in the book Jodie has a life long scar from one such beating.
Essentially, the mother was suffering from what we would today call PTSD. As a result of a mental breakdown she literally forgets that she ever had children for years. By the time she remembers, she's old and she dies before going back to find them. iirc the husband also rages to Kya that he would kill her if she ever returned... something the mother probaby understood intuitively. (In the book she dies about two years before Jodie and Kya reconnect.)
Without going into my own personal details, back in the early 60s my mother disappeared for a over a year before coming back to see us. During that time we never once heard from her and had simply been told that she had left.
Back then people... particularly those from lower socio-economic levels... turned a blind eye to wife battering. Kind of 'don't ask, don't tell'.
I thought the same thing as the OP while I was watching. She is a horrible mother. Yes, of course it was horrible that she was getting beat by her husband. The main character's whole family sucked.
Even if she had PTSD, that is not an excuse for her to leave her children behind with an abusive man. As someone that has lived with a family member who has had PTSD my whole life, your mental illness should not have anything to do with a choice like that you make. Yes, it will effect your behavior, but big life decisions, no. If you truly love and care about someone, you will not leave them behind.
"your mental illness should not have anything to do with a choice like that you make"
Consider what you wrote just there. Maybe you replied too hastily.
City streets, parks, and tent cities across the US and Canada are overflowing with hundreds of thousands of people suffering, living and dying from mental illnesses that affect their ability to make healthy choices, or morally acceptable choices.
Whatever I'm not going to get into a back-and-forth here. My personal experiences are very different from yours I guess. I totally sympathize with a the mother's situation in this movie.
I very much did consider what I wrote. I've studied mental illness. I know what I'm talking about. I have struggled with mental health myself.
This isn't about her PTSD if she has that, it's about her personality. I've learned that someone, whether or not they have such a mental disorder, would still make the same choice about a big life decision. Now maybe if she had say, a different mental illness, such as BPD, it could be different.
However, I do sympathize with you and respect your opinion.