I wouldn't call her nutty - I am sure she is sane and well intentioned - but I did cringe throughout reading that article. What I didn't say was, "Wow if only my parents pushed an micromanaged me like that I would be successful and happy."

Good intentions can't justify abuse, and I don't know of a better for a pattern of calling one's child "garbage":

  Once when I was young—maybe more than once—when I was extremely disrespectful
  to my mother, my father angrily called me "garbage" in our native Hokkien dialect.
  It worked really well.