Apologize to a semi-romantic friend without implying a desire to get together after my break up

Question

Context

I recently exited a long term relationship (3+ years). During the last year and a half of the relationship I grew quite close with another friend. This came to a head about six months before my relationship ended, with the realization that this friend and I shared mutual feelings for each other, beyond just friendship.

However, after the initial conversation where we came to this realization (there was wine involved) we rarely talked about it and never in any great depth. By my inaction, I implicitly chose to stay with my then-SO; though again this was never explicitly stated or addressed between this friend and I.

Fast forward to now, after my SO and I have separated. I've been reflecting on the relationship and the things that led to its failure, as one does. One of the conclusions I've come to is that I treated this friend of mine quite terribly during this period. In the vernacular, I "had them on the hook": never outright rejecting them while also keeping a spark of hope alive for "someday".

This, coupled with small things I did throughout this period, contributed to my disrespect of both their time/energy and their feelings for me. Further, some of the things this friend has said to me recently has confirmed my belief that they feel disrespected because of my actions.

To be clear, I have only come to this realization upon reflection after the fact. In the moment, I was completely unaware of the affect I was having on them, which is another problem.

Question

Is there a way that I can convey a sincere apology to this friend without implying that, now that I am no longer in a relationship, I want to get together with them. I want to assure them of the following:

• I value their feelings
• I am sorry for disrespecting them
• I am sorry for not recognizing that I was disrespecting them
• While this self-reflection happened as a result of my break up, this apology is not a ploy to try to get together with them

I suspect that there may not be a way to accomplish all of the above, so barring that, how can I convey as much of the above as possible?

To conclude, I respect this friend very much, and I highly value their opinion of me. While I accept that I may have irrevocably damaged that opinion, I would at least like to try to apologize for my mistakes. That is more important to me that anything.

Answer 1

Since you seem to be good friends, visiting each other and such, I would go ahead and tell them essentially what you have told us here. As a rough outline,

Ex and I broke up recently, and I've been doing a lot of introspection as a result. I realize now, looking back, that I had treated you pretty poorly during that time and didn't respect your feelings, and I'm very sorry for that. I really value your friendship, and hope you can forgive me.

Keep focused on your remorse for past actions and respect for them, and don't mention feelings beyond appreciating them as a friend.

It's great to have concrete examples of what you value about the friendship too, e.g. "I really value your feedback on my fanfiction" or "You're the best checkers player I know!" This keeps the conversation grounded and is an opportunity for you to be clear about what you're hoping for going forward. (Something like "I hope we can still hang out", on the other hand, is fairly vague and could be interpreted as a potential for dates, especially if they wanted to see it that way.)

If it's true, you could also explain if you're still processing the breakup, e.g. "I feel terrible about for how selfish I was being without even realizing it, so I think I need to spend the next few months to seriously reflect and work on myself." That way, they know you are focusing first and foremost on becoming a better person, rather than seeking a replacement relationship. If you are worried about lingering feelings, this will help make it clear you're not trying to get into that right now.

I would steer very clear of the (drunken?) confession of feelings here, especially as you haven't discussed it since. Bringing it up now will just muddy the waters - if you two still have mutual feelings when you are ready for a relationship, you can talk about it then :) If not, it will just be a painful reminder at a time when you're trying to apologize.

Answer 2

Given that this question was asked nearly two years ago, I assume you've already taken some sort of action. However, I have been on the other side of an eerily similar situation about seven years ago, so perhaps I can provide some insight into how your friend may (have) respond(ed) to the apology. Note that my situation is idiosyncratic, just like all situations, so the details may not apply, but I believe the general lesson I learned from this is relevant and valuable.

I received a written apology that was consistent with @EmC's suggestions, almost exactly. It focused on (1) my friend's admission that their behavior toward me had been disrespectful, (2) their awareness of how it must have hurt me, (3) that they deeply regret it and wish they could take it back, and (4) all of the positive attributes about me that they admired and loved. There were no excuses at all--a textbook-perfect apology. They also stayed away from mentioning any romantic feelings for me (I think... though memory of the letter is a bit cloudy since it's been so long). It was a real boost to my ego to hear such nice sentiments about myself from someone I deeply respected and admired. It felt extremely validating to have them express understanding of the pain I had been feeling and to have them take complete ownership of that.

So what was the effect? Well, it's a bit complicated. There were two effects, one short-term, and one long-term. And I would say that both of these reactions were pretty much out of the control of my friend. The short-term effect was that it initially amplified my feelings, and gave me hope we could eventually be together. I was going through my own relationship transition and had always thought of that person as "the one that got away." I took this letter as confirmatory evidence of my hypothesis that we were "meant to be." Due to the idiosyncrasies of my particular case, after a few years of some back-and-forth, I finally decided to cut off ties, not necessarily because they did anything wrong. I realized my mindset about and around them was just not healthy. It was for me and me only, and, even years later, I feel strongly that it was the right move for me. It gave me the space to reframe everything that happened and to understand my own thought patterns around the relationship. In the long-term, I still reflect upon the apology letter, and though I have mixed feelings about it -- some very positive and some very negative -- I realize that my feelings would be much more negative, my resentment stronger, if I had never received the apology. I do think the apology is somewhat healing.

In sum, even with a perfect apology, just know that your friend may remain upset with you, hold resentment towards you, and have a hard time forgiving you (if they ever do). But that doesn't mean it was the wrong move to apologize. Your friend will likely prefer the world in which you offer a heartfelt apology (with no excuses) than the counterfactual reality in which you don't. You have no control over how they react or whether they want to continue being your friend. That is completely up to them, and you should give them space to make that decision on their own. But if you really care about your friend -- and apologizing is not just an attempt for you to feel better about yourself and is not a self-interested attempt to maintain the friendship -- an apology will likely help them heal.

Answer 3

How can I convey as much of the above as possible?

Ultimately, what will convey this the most is not through an apology, but your actions.

Stating each one of those points in an apology is still a good start though; just keep in mind that apologies are tricky and can backfire if approached with the wrong mindset. Luckily it seems from your question that you are already aware of this but I will highlight some reasons why just for the sake of saying it. You expressed remorse, took responsibility, did not try to make excuses, are not trying to gain something through apologising and did not expect that everything will be immediately forgiven. If you can keep this in mind when you apologise then it should not backfire and will be a big help when you start on the real answer to your question, which is showing her with your actions.

If you want her to know you respect and value her feelings, then value her feelings and do things that show you value her feelings. Exactly the same goes for all the other points; you want to convey that your reform is not a ploy to try and get together with her, then after telling her in the apology, show it and after [X] amount of time she will understand that you were sincere.

Lastly, circling back to the worry you expressed in your question, that at the time of apology she believe it is implied that you are trying to get back together with her. With my answer, what I am saying is the best you can do at the time is tell her openly and sincerely. Either she will believe you or not, but it is what you do after that really matters in terms of conveying those things to her.

Answer 4

Timing seems critical here. You have just broken up with someone, and unless that is super-top-secret then there is a chance that the friend to whom you wish to apologise knows about this. Perhaps you share even just one common friend, or maybe she's seen your relationship status on social media, there are a number of ways she could know. Even if she doesn't, it might be one of the first things she asks you if you got back in contact and unless you lie then it will have to come out. So, if you contact her right now there is a very high chance that she will either think (a) you want to get back together, or at the very least (b) that your breakup has prompted the contact and you're going through a post-breakup 'what does it all mean' thing.

The thought also occurs that you may also be in denial about your reasons to contact her. It would be understandable, you have just gone through a breakup and you surely are going over the reasons why it ended in your mind. Why else has this old flame suddenly come back to mind? It can't be coincidence.

I am not going to provide suggested wording as to what you should say to her if you do talk, only say that you should go with your instincts but consider holding off for now. You may not still feel it is necessary to apologise when you are fully over the breakup, but if you do, it won't seem to her like you are on the rebound.