How do you forgive yourself when you’ve made a mistake?

[myredcardiganbob]

Just that really. Sincere apologies (mine) have been given and accepted, the other person even said sorry for their reaction to my mistake! But this was done over the phone and I’m so worried next time I see the person which won’t be until the weekend, it will feel like the elephant in the room and I’ll feel awkward and uncomfortable. I think they’ve forgiven me... how do I forgive myself?

If it was a mistake and they’ve accepted your apology, do you need to forgive yourself?

I guess it depends on the implications of the mistake. If it was something very minor I’d forgive myself quite quickly. I’d probably be a bit annoyed with myself but not for long.

If it was something major, I couldn’t say how long it would take.

Thanks for your replies - maybe that’s it, I’m annoyed at myself for making the mistake in the first place and embarrassed by it. Actually, I think that is it - I’m embarrassed. Feck, how do you move past feeling embarrassed? I don’t know the other person very well so they don’t have the experience of knowing me and my usual wise/good behaviour! Maybe that’s what’s bothering me most :(

I don’t know, I rather suppose it depends what you’ve done?!

Ah, you feel a bit of a tit. That always bothers me until I do something that makes me feel more of a tit If they’ve accepted your apology then I’d just try and forget about it.

Puds, a total tit! Yep, just have to accept the embarrassment is mine and if I can’t let go of it then it will turn this into an even bigger deal, which I don’t want. In the grand scheme of things it wasn’t the worst thing ever - I thought I was being ghosted so sent the person a message to say that I had a feeling I wasn’t going to hear from him again so I wanted him to know that I’d really enjoyed the time we had spent together, that it had brought me a lot of happiness and wished him well. Was trying to be dignified. He responded quickly, quite angrily and said that his elderly parents had been in a car accident and he’d been caught up dealing with everything related to that and what on earth had given me the impression that things were off between us just because he hadn’t been in touch. It was hideous, I was mortified and even though we’ve spoken now and he said sorry for his quick reaction and that I have nothing to apologise for, I’m still really embarrassed that previous experience with other people made me feel that I was quietly being given the elbow. Off to google a tedtalk - wonder if they do a ‘how not to feel like a tit’

I understand your embarrassment, but a word of warning, in online dating it's incredible how many men's family members are in accidents, grandparents die, sisters have babies, grandparents die again, phones get lost, Wi-fi blackout etc Maybe his elderly parents were in an accident, or maybe they weren't. Tread carefully x

I wouldn’t be embarrassed about that. I think I’m this day and age it’s unfortunately perfectly normal to think you’re being ghosted if someone suddenly disappears. What I would be wary of is his angry reaction! No need for that. A simple ‘this has happened’ would do.

Don’t stress it. I’ve definitely done worse

How long had he been out of touch for? How long have you been together? Context is everything. One day....yeah you were silly.....two weeks.....not so much!

said that his elderly parents had been in a car accident and he’d been caught up dealing with everything related to that

I highly doubt that's true. It takes 10 seconds to send a text, or to call someone on hands free whilst still doing stuff. My guess is that he has a few women on the go, and has spread himself thinly, thus not keeping on top of messages.

^This. I bet if this was you, you would have found 10 seconds to explain why you hadn't been in touch much. You don't have anything to feel bad about.

Thanks all, I appreciate the red flag warning but it really was me being daft, it had only been an afternoon from the day before to the following night, it was just very unlike him. I am in agreement though that a 10 second, parents had car accident, can’t talk, catch you later would have been helpful - but helpful to me it’s really not his job to ‘fix’ my sensitivity about not being in contact. When we spoke last night and he apologised for his sharp reaction, he explained that a previous relationship had ended in part because of an expectation of constant messaging.

I’m embarrassed by my reaction and wish I could have sat on my hands before messaging, we haven’t been seeing each other long and I don’t think I’ve quite hit the top priority text when there’s an emergency status yet!

Well you were a bit hasty if it was less than 24 hours.

When you say you are seeing him on the weekend, is that an arranged date?

Hasty is a very good word! I was.

Yes, well, we’d talked about seeing each other again this coming Friday when we said cheerio on Saturday. Once we said goodbye on Saturday, he was going on to meet his pals for some beers, football watching and a bit of a night out. The last I heard from him was teatime on the Saturday. My initial thought on Sunday afternoon was that something had happened to him after my wee message saying that I’d hoped he’d had a great night with his friends. By early evening I hadn’t heard from him so sent a very quick, is everything okay? And by 9.30 - where I should have sat on my hands - I sent the message I described above. And wish I hadn’t . Aye, hasty is the right word!

*after my wee message I sent early Sunday afternoon went unanswered

That should have said.

Oh dear, I thought you were going to say it had been several days. So, less than 24 hours? Hmm.

It’s okay, I can take the judgement! My original post was to ask how best to make peace with yourself when you’ve made a mistake - I already know that I did and have said sorry profusely to the person. It’s how I move on from feeling embarrassed about it that I originally posted about rather than asking people’s opinion about whether my message was justified or not - it wasn’t and I did the wrong thing. I should have sat on my hands and let it be, like a sane person.

And not that it matters because I know I was an idiot, it was more than 24 hours, 5pm Saturday til 9.30pm ish Sunday