Gawd there are some horrific stories on here - but sadly not uncommon. Some mums DO think they have the God given right to speak like shit to their daughters, and criticize them, and to an extent aunties do it too. (And sometimes grans.)
My mum (born mid 1930s) was horrifically critical of everything I did, and always had something to say about my weight. (I was born 1960s...) A couple of aunts were the same (one was dad's sister, one was mum's sister.) I was also told in my teens, that I'd 'never get a man' if I didn't slim down. (I was 11 stone and size 14 in my teens and classed as a bit 'chubby.') As some posters have said, the main goal for most women pre 1980s was to get a man, get married, have children. Women who didn't (and they were very few back then) were classed as social outcasts, a bit odd, failures.... and they generally just lived with their parents forever... (Most of them.)
My mum bashed my choice of clothes, my hair, my make up, my car, my job, and said I looked like a 'dirty looking slut' when I dressed in a mini skirt and t-shirt on a summer night to go for a drink with friends when I was 19. I had lost 2 stone by then, and the outfit looked good!
She never had a good word to say about my DH either, slagging him off from the minute I met him, as he was 'only' a factory worker, and 'how's a factory worker's wage going to keep a family when you have children?' DH disliked her from the beginning, as she never gave him reason to like her, and because of the way she slagged me off, even constantly criticizing everything I did as a mother. She also started on my DD's weight, and I told her I was never bringing her back when she said 'she's getting fat!' when she was THREE years old, and just healthy, and a normal weight. Only the threat of not seeing her again shut her up.
When DH got a job in an office after retraining, she kept banging on about how he needs to go for manager and not be just an 'office bod.'
Funnily enough, I have no recollection whatsoever of her criticising my brother (7 years younger,) and he could never do any wrong. He was a lazy, workshy layabout who was always cadging money off my mum and dad, and on a number of occasions, she asked ME if had any money for him, as he was a 'bit strapped for cash right now.' By the age of 35, he had not worked for more than 3-4 years, and they were all odd jobs/unskilled labour. He left school at 16 (with no qualifications.) Mum enabled him though, by treating him like his shit don't stink.
As I say my aunts were the same, and idolised my brother, and slagged me off half the time I saw them. Sometimes my clothes, sometimes my weight, or anything they could think of really.
Also, DH's auntie and mum, seemed obsessed with weight, and mentioned to me several times that I better stay slim if I want to keep DH. I gained weight when I was expecting DD (obvs) and within several DAYS of having her, his aunt said 'you're a proper size aren't you? Size of a cow. You MUST breastfeed and get all that weight off you.' His aunt was worse than his mum, but his mum made barbed comments occasionally too. Again, NOTHING was said to the men! (DH has 2 brothers, and their wives got it too!)
I don't know if mums who had children post 1980s are like this now, but I certainly am not. I never want my DD to feel like the older women in my life made me feel when I was younger. I would NEVER speak to anyone the way they spoke to me. And unlike some others on here, I do NOT forgive them. Not even my mother. Her mother had quite a critical streak in her, and she was quite critical of my mum and my aunt, (but idolised their brother,) so it was clearly a case of 'monkey see monkey do' but they should have known how shitty it felt and not done it to me.
So no, I don't forgive her. (Or any of them.) The way I was spoken to and insulted and critisised when I was young - even a child - made me hugely insecure and angsty with really low self esteem and a desperation to be liked. And it made me vulnerable, and easily bullied, and easily used by people.
DH never knew his mum and aunt said stuff to me by the way, he was always out of the room when they said it. I know I should have said something but I didn't. I wish I had though...
My parents and DH's died in the first few years of this century by the way, and our mums made sour and barbed comments right up to their deathbed!