I think she is prone to crazy rages. A lot of you don't remember much about child rearing practices before extensive CPS and LE involvement and laws prohibiting physical harm to children, but for some of us (LS's mother's age and older), we're well aware that things were different.
In the story of my relative who I believe is similar to LS (my aunt Frieda), Frieda routinely threatened mutilation and mayhem to kids and everyone else. It was noted by relatives that Frieda was fine with infants, but after around age 6-7, she was increasingly abusive. She threatened to do lots of things (put nails through people's hands for example) but only did a fraction of those things. She also did things like starve kids (and others) and then offer them food that was poisoned or otherwise inedible (putting laxatives in food was funny to her - she always said she had a great sense of humor).
I think LS was like that. I think she threatened the kids with mayhem regularly (and I bet her threats were very "creative"). I think she acted on threats on Sunday night. She used something sharp on him. Something from the garage, a saw or planer or putty knife or similar. Maybe a box cutter. Something that came from the garage. She went too far. Not only that, but his injuries would have put her in jail. These kinds of people don't "spank," they gouge and slice and threaten more of the same. For whatever reason, she finally lost control (my theory: her marriage was on the rocks, threats or fear of abandonment send people like LS into a semi-psychotic or psychotic state, if you've never seen it, it's terrifying).
She didn't stab him a bunch of times and then shoot him because he wasn't dead. She cut him, he bled all over, she saw her own dilemma, she decided to get rid of him. She may have hit him with the 2x4 so that he'd stop crying Sunday night. She may have hit again with it, after leaving the house, because she took it to dispose of it and it was handy.
In one case of a similar woman, she made a space under the floor boards and stuck her not-favorite kid (her son) in there and the family would eat dinner above him, while he starved (not knowing he was there, asking where he was, told multiple lies about where he was) and she told him he'd never eat again if he made a peep. Yep. And that man went on to become an M.D. and a psychiatrist. He had scars from her abuse. He's now 64 years old. He did in fact run away from home...
