Well, that's what can happen when a person spends a lot of time with another person who is "dysfunctional", they can take on the other person's dysfunctional behavior patterns unknowingly.

I have seen this myself and I also am challenged with my own husband who reacts to me in ways that "trigger me" and I can't seem to get him to recognize it either. I find myself wishing I had a small video camera attached to my head or somehow could record him so I can have a way of showing him how badly he reacts towards me. I firmly believe that people behave badly and are really unaware of it. I get triggered all the time because I am "alone" with it and I don't have anyone to witness how bad he can get sometimes.

If you could find a way to have some kind of hidden video so you could record this behavior of hers and then "show it to her"? I think that's the only way she might get it. I think about this "constantly myself" because I can't get my husband to recognize his "bad habits" of interacting with me, he just ends up "denying" it. I get so bad that I often respond on the defensive before he presents his bad habits towards me.
I am wondering if that is how bad your mother is now, she reacts in constant anger from "years" of being treated so badly, it has become a weird reflex. That is what "years" of abuse does to someone, it just breaks them down to where they are constantly on the defensive with "anyone" that reminds them of the "triggering abuse". It sounds like your mother doesn't know how to "function" without it so even though she "divorced" him, she still is trapped in the "dysfunction" , its her "normal" and she has "lost her independent thinking". She has developed a "victim mentality" and is "unaware" how "toxic" it has made her.

We all can get into a "routine" in our mindset, auto pilot, that we are not consciously "aware of". People can get into a routine of working and living their lives a certain way and "retirement" is such a shock to them that they actually die a short time "after" they retire. The same thing can happen with a long time relationship with another person, we tend to get so used to the patterns and "adapt" subconsciously that any kind of "end" or "change" can become a huge challenge and as with your mother, she never could really free herself from it and be "independent".

OE