my one criticism about ishwari being headcanoned as a 'soft mom because it wouldnt make sense that ajay would be desperate to respect her wishes' is that like
as an asian person i can attest to the fact there is no room for softness in asian mothers, but you have to take into account what she was like in kyrat (im ignoring the dlc but honestly the writing on her was okay enough to use as a basis). she's resilient and impeccable and would not hesitate to throw hands because she was made in a war. obviously she'd be very protective of her babies but she won't let them grow up weak.
i think it would've been a very different story if she had her happy ending with pagan, yes i might actually consider that she would've been softer, though i wish there was more parallel in pagan's statement "men only really love you in hindsight" to show that ajay only ever really loved ishwari to the fullest when she died
we literally only know that ajay was a difficult child growing up. lots of things attested to the fact ishwari was too traumatized to talk about his identity, growing up an asian immigrant in a non-ideal financial state in america. remember that ajay doesn't know jack shit about kyrat and still went because he loves his mommy. maybe it's also the only 'i love you' he can say to her now.
and you know. difficult children are due to difficult parents. you can't tell me ishwari was a pushover, was sensitive, was emotionally stable enough to see all of the trouble that's gone through her life and be at peace with it.
ajay probably had to deal with her lashing out randomly, trying to help her constantly as a child but feeling helpless because she refused his help, had to fight with her growing up or even so much as got as angry as she did just to try and understand her. she was a force in his life that he resented but was so desperate to have a relationship with. she was all he had and remembered, his whole fucking life.
as a guy who was raised by a single mom with an emotionally out of touch person i can barely call my brother, i definitely fucking can.
the emotional distance also lines up with the fact ishwari didn't tell him shit even when he started going straight. but we know they made peace, at least to some extent, because she left her love note and last words to him for ajay to remember, and ajay fulfilled that wish because he loved her too.
the funny thing is, though, ishwari isn't just making sure ajay fulfills her wish. she's traumatizing him one last time to go with it. and ajay makes that choice between making peace with it and scattering her ashes (sparing pagan) or letting it take him and abandon her (killing pagan)
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