Originally Posted by
jmartin 
My AW has made several attempts to "make amends" that have also devolved into similar blaming of others, offering of excuses, and other things that have not sounded much to me like she is accepting responsibility for her actions. As if to say yes, she drank, but there were extenuating circumstances! Like you, I have sometimes wondered whether she is getting bad advice from a sponsor or counselor. I am left with the feeling that she is apologizing because she knows she is supposed to..., or in order to get something that she wants
Not to hijack this thread and Lizatola I've already told you what I think... his amends were, awful, incomplete, and a host of other things I can think of that don't involve nice language. I liked the other response about amends and that is you don't have to accept them.
So back to my hijacking and a few things that Jmartin mentioned above that resonated with me. First I confess having rationalized my addiction while active and in the early days of sobriety with the extenuating circumstances nonsense. We addicts are all too good at rationalizing stuff and our bad behavior. Whats tough to do and admit is that there are a pile of other people that have experienced (fill in the blank-loss, illness, rejection, abuse, etc) that DON'T go self medicating. At the end of the day if our drinking is affecting other people negatively then all of our rationalization doesn't matter. So if you are a little, shall we say "perturbed" by that you should be.
Regarding the apologizing because she feels like she has to. Honestly from the addict perspective I GET that temptation. Your spouse is angry. Kids are angry. Everyone else you may have harmed is angry. Ya wanna make that go away and I definitely know I felt some pressure. You know you screwed up and want to make that go away STAT. I've done my first round of making amends but I confess that the ones very early on were probably made for selfish reasons. I in fact likely need to do a REDO of them. That said trust your gut which it sounds like you're already doing. If you feel like she's checking off a list to pacify you you're probably RIGHT. If she's genuinely sincere time and actions will tell. Just felt a need to respond to this piece since it jumped out at me.
Hang in there all and peace in your journeys wherever they make take you.