I've only had mine a couple months, but I've accepted the cold behaviour as being normal. It makes perfect sense that if the mechanics and/or electronics performed outside the expected parameters we would be seeing codes.
My Vehicle Health Report says everything is fine.

I just let mine sit at idle for a few minutes when it's cold outside. 4K on a cold engine is not something I like to do.

 

If the behavior was consistent with that vehicle, I'd be more likely to accept it as normal.

If all the Escapes we've had (we've had lots, 3 of this vintage) behaved the same I'd accept it as normal.

One abnormal event might generate a pending event which would get deleted when the vehicle warmed up and responded normally. If every single event that was out of spec generated a stored code your vehicle would need larger memory to hold them all, lol.

That said, a long shift or two when cold never really worried me, it's just one of those things.

 

Might take a look at:

Escape City - Ford Escape Forums - Ford Escape, Mercury Mariner, Mazda Tribute, Ford Maverick - View topic - 6 Speed Tranny Updates

And / Or

Escape City - Ford Escape Forums - Ford Escape, Mercury Mariner, Mazda Tribute, Ford Maverick - View topic - 2009-2010 E/M - TSB: Harsh 1-2 shift, 2-3 shift flare

I do not know if the above applies to later models, but it seems to be a similar performance.
Where is the Trans Tech guy... (I'm searching for his ID to ask him.)
tom

Found him:

Maybe "MarkFormer Ford Automatic Transmission Engineer 1988 - 2007"

He posted here:

https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...escape-v6.html
can answer the question better.

 

Ill check codes for the fun of it

 

Ive already talked to that guy "Mark Kovalski" about my 2010 escape harsh shifting and he declined to comment because he has no experience with these transmissions.

Not it sure if this matches your symptoms but I think it's called "shift flare", and someone on this forum once told me that the common fix is to "empty your wallet" lol.

 

I don't believe mine is having shift flare. My understanding is that shift flare is when the transmission has a period of "neither" gear and the throttle fails to drop sufficiently so it shifts rough when it finally finds the gear it's shifting to (maybe I've got that wrong).

Mine has a suspended time at a much higher RPM than I desire, then it finally shifts in a normal fashion.