With my Nmother's obsession with perfection and cleanliness (she's OCPD and N), she found white clothes unacceptable. She would not allow me to wear white or light colored shirts. I have recently discovered that I have a birth defect which causes me to be more careless with food. So there would be no way to stop messing up my clothes. She harped on me a lot for getting food on my dresses and shirts. She told me to never buy anything light colored or with white in it. Only recently I started buying light and white colored clothes. I never realized the connection until I bought a blouse with a flowers on a white background. Then my Nmother's directive came to mind.
When I was around nine my Nmother, after I took a shower, inspected my arms and legs to make sure I was spotless. Again her obsession with perfection and cleanliness, she found my left elbow unacceptable. She made me go back into the bathroom to clean it. After several unacceptable attempts to wash my elbow on my own, my Nmother dragged me into the bathroom and proceeded to scrub my elbow raw. Only then did she see that it was a birthmark, a very sore and reddened, brownish birthmark.
I always wondered why she never saw it before that day. It didn't just show up when I turned nine! Looking back I think this was one of the strangest things that my Nmother did.
