My words have got stronger but I still get lectured at when we have our 'talks'. I'm not very good at arguing or debating. I never went to uni, didn't do well at school because I hated it and refused, passive aggressively, to do any work and so never learnt to analyse stuff and present a cohesive argument.
Old Dog- I agree there's not much use trying to be persuasive right now. However you are in control of being on the receiving end of lectures.
Early in my career I managed a call center. The employees weren't allowed to hang up on callers no matter how rude or abusive they got. So we trained them (in the very worst situations) to say "I'm going to have to put you on hold for a few moments until you can lower your voice and not use profanity when speaking to me".
The equivalent in the real world is just to say you aren't going to continue the conversation unless the other person can be respectful. In your case I think it would sound somthing like "W, I can see this is important and I would like to continue this conversation, but it feels like you are lecturing me and telling me what to do, so I won't be able to proceed until you are able to speak to me in a respectful tone". And then follow up and don't continue the conversation until she does that.
Of course - I am in the camp that you need to put some distance between you and her - she brings you so far down every time she's around. But I understand that isn't possible for the next month or so, until your son is recovered. So, I offer the above suggestion as a way to empower yourself :-).
