How to say a BIG “I’m sorry” to your Partner: A Guide to Full and Meaningful Apologies
Crafting a proper apology for your partner involves more than just saying "sorry".
It requires a combination of sincerity, accountability, and empathy to ensure that the person you're apologizing to feels heard and valued. This guide may come across as offensively basic, but often it’s the basic stuff that never gets taught. Here is a guide for a full apology:
1. Notice that Something is Wrong.
When you see your partner behaving differently than normal (not smiling, giving short or blunt answers, or displaying closed-off body language) you can inquire what is wrong by asking them directly or by reflecting on the day and/or the interactions that took place since they were last “open” toward you. If you’ve recognized that you’ve hurt your partner - take the time to confront it and clarify how they feel about it. This confrontation can be as simple as, “Hey, I noticed you’ve been different with me ever since I _______ and I wonder if you’d let me apologize for that?”.
2. Give them the Floor with Understanding and Empathy.
Before rushing to an apology, give your partner the opportunity to respond. Giving someone “the floor” - means allowing them to show their full range of emotions, even if that includes anger, disappointment, or other uncomfortable feelings or words. Remember, creating space for these reactions - is creating space for healing and reconciliation. Now, these reactions and responses should not be tolerant of violence or abuse towards you or anyone else - but simply being upset and expressing it, is not the same thing. Try not to interrupt - even if your partner is exaggerating, they are likely telling you how big and real something felt, rather than trying to be accurate, and that’s okay - for now. Seek to put yourself in their world for a moment, NOT AS YOU ARE, BUT AS THEY ARE, and allow yourself to feel the emotional impact that they are describing. Phrases like, "I would be angry if I thought you forgot about me, too" can help convey understanding and empathy.
Tip: Use body language like eye contact, nodding, and a calm, neutral expression to show you are listening. Mirror the other person’s facial expressions to display empathy. Take a backseat for now and treat this stage with curiosity, like an investigator or detective trying to find an explanation for this emotional reaction. Once you know what has caused the situation you will be more equipped to solve it. It can help to repeat back what you’ve heard, to ensure you got it correct.
Avoid the temptation of defensiveness and self-pity, such as 'Why does this have to happen now?' or 'He/she is too sensitive; they are making a big deal out of nothing!'" How? By engaging empathy and believing that once you’ve allowed the other person’s emotions to release, you’ll have an opportunity to clarify and state your case, as well. Which brings us to the next step.
3. Accept Responsibility with Clarity and Truth.
Once you’ve acknowledged that your partner’s emotions are valid, in their world at least, but hopefully in yours too - move on to taking responsibility for whatever part of the problem you are willing to - simply by saying, “I hear you and I’m willing to take responsibility for _______”.
Equally important is to offer your partner clarifying and reassuring statements that relate directly to their expressed hurts, complaints, and worries. It takes moving beyond pride, selfishness, and self pity, to generously offer sober-minded corrections with truth, consideration, and accuracy. Leaving your partner to sit in uncorrected lies or false beliefs causes a lot of damage that will take more work to undo later on. And yes, they may not side with you after all, and you may have to repeat yourself in the face of their objections - but there should be more than a few attempts at convincing and comforting them, before going to “take it or leave it”.
4. Express Genuine Remorse.
This is when the words "I'm sorry" actually do go a long way. Make sure your apology is authentic and that you truly mean it. If you are feeling emotions (you should be), challenge yourself to be vulnerable and express them. “I feel gutted that I broke your new mug”; “I feel angry at myself that I embarrassed you again”; “I feel like even when I try, I still fail”. These types of statements can convey that you also are hurting from this experience and may ignite some empathy in your partner.
5. Offer a Solution.
The key word here is - offer. You may want to bring this up in step one - or whenever feels right, but for many people, knowing that a solution and amends will be offered, even if they can’t fathom what could make them feel better at the time, makes them feel better at the time.
This is where you express your personal interest in wanting to solve the problem so that you can reduce or prevent its recurrence. Both you and your partner must agree that this implementation will work - it is also okay to let them know that you will be coming up with something and ask them for some time to do so - offering them the opportunity to help if they want to.
Complete your response - with ability! Use physical reminders in order to not yo forget to implement the solution/s that you have promised. You can write down a contract or create rules, consequences, and boundaries regarding it - again, these are to be offered by you.
5. Offer Amends.
Where a solution helps solve the problem - amends helps your partner feel better in the moment. Offer a clever or creative way to make up for the harm. If you are struggling, ask them for ideas on what would make them feel better. This demonstrates a commitment to fixing the issue and moving forward positively.
When we hurt someone, we leave an emotional wound. When we apologize using all of these steps including a solution, we put a bandage on that wound, but sometimes even a bandage doesn’t make us feel better and we would rather go out and get an ice cream. Making amends is like giving your partner ice cream—it helps you both feel better (and sometimes, the amends could literally be ice cream!). Be creative in how you come up with amends, think of what your partner likes or even have them choose something. It could be a massage, ordering in, doing their chores for the next week, letting them choose the next date night, anything that makes them feel happier and restores the warmth in the relationship.
6. Reconciliation and Follow-Up.
This is the ultimate goal of an apology. Reconciliation is a return to the original warmth that was in the relationship, maybe even better than before. See if you partner is willing to engage with you in the same way they were, before the issue or conflict. If they still need time - ask them how much, or see if you need to repeat previous steps.
Essentially, reconciliation is obvious - it means that you are back to hugging and kissing and being close again. There are no hard feelings, and you both feel that you have forgiven each other. If you sense your partner is not back to normal, repeat step 1.
Have the Courage to Follow-up: Just because your partner is smiling and interacting again, doesn’t mean that they aren’t still struggling. Ensure that you bring the subject up gently again, after the amends or later on, to see that you’re still on the same page. This shows that you're genuinely interested in rebuilding trust and that the apology wasn't just a one-time gesture.
Here you can ask your partner if they have any questions about what happened. If they were satisfied with the outcome. You can give your partner a chance to express any of the emotions that they are still feeling and/or figure out more amends or solutions if they are doubting the efficiency of the current ones. Here you can discuss the effectiveness of the apology, if there are any insufficiencies you can fix them here so that both parties are satisfied, and you can return to unity.
7. Check-in.
Finally, ensure that your solutions are still in place over the next days/weeks. This may involve tweaking some of the boundaries or guidelines if they have not been working or were too difficult to upkeep.
If you are struggling to keep up with the solutions in place you can talk to your partner about updating them. Perhaps you need to add a second alarm to remind you about your clothes on the floor, or you need to write down notes in frequently visited places to remember better (fridge, phone wallpaper, light switches, bathroom mirror, etc.). There are no limits to the creativity needed to make your relationship work. Explore solutions as far as you are comfortable. Both your actions and inactions are meaningful!
