This is SUCH A GOOD ARTICLE!! You handled this nuanced topic very well. The blame game is just another way that duality presents itself in this world. Empathy in a way is recognising a level of nonduality in others.

I am also a survivor of narcissistic abuse from my mother, and yet while I definitely needed to shed the guilt I felt for a long time, and I need to maintain strong boundaries with her, the truth is that I know she's a very complex person and isn't an evil villain, even if her actions were harmful. They came from a place of pain, unfortunately a pain I am not equipped to heal. She had been even more abused as a child herself.

Empathising with her isn't saying what she did was OK, or invalidating the pain I felt. The two things can be true at once. It's not a zero sum game.