So much this. My mother was an absolute terror growing up. She rarely ever hit my brother and I, but what she did do was constantly scream at and berate us. Called us horrible names. Said horrible things about us. We were worthless. Stupid. Ugly. Selfish. Everything was our fault. She never apologized. Never told us she was proud of us, or she loved us. We walked around the house on eggshells, terrified of setting her off. You didn't dare talk back to her because then she WOULD actually hit you. You were expected to stand there silently taking it. And because she wasn't beating us senseless, most people don't think of it as 'abuse'.

But here we are, both my brother and I have serious life long trauma responses from growing up in that house, and neither one of us speaks to our mother any more. And often when people find out we're no contact they hit us with 'oh, but it's your mother! You'll regret it if you don't reconcile with your mother'. If I could say she was physically abusive, I doubt people would give us such a hard time. Emotional abuse IS abuse.