How to Accept an Apology That May Never Come – An Exclusive Interview With Christie Frenette
Brainz Magazine Exclusive Interview
Christie Frenette, MSW, RSW, is Executive Director of Riptide Counselling Inc., an Adjunct Professor at the University of Toronto, and a therapist whose work focuses on trauma, attachment, and grief. She supports individuals, couples, and families as they work to build safer, more connected relationships.
She is also the author of the forthcoming children’s book "If You Leave Me Tomorrow", which explores disenfranchised grief and offers caregivers guidance on supporting a child through pain.
In this interview, Christie explains why the end of a relationship can bring grief even when the other person is still alive, how people can begin to heal without waiting for an apology, and what it means to stay with someone’s pain before trying to fix it.
Christie Frenette, MSW, RSW, Executive Director of Riptide Counselling Inc.
Your work brings together trauma, attachment, and grief. How do these experiences connect?
Attachment is the bond that forms between a baby and a primary caregiver. It helps shape the child’s sense of trust, safety, and emotional wellbeing. When there are difficulties in that relationship, such as a mismatch in temperament or unresolved grief in a parent, they can affect how a secure attachment develops.
Trauma is personal. An experience that is traumatic for one person may not be traumatic for someone else. It depends on how the person experiences and carries it in their body. Adverse childhood experiences can become deeply embedded in the nervous system.
Then there is grief: the felt experience of loss. A friend once explained a word to me that captures the ache of missing a person, place, or time. That sense of longing can describe grief more clearly than the word itself.
Trauma can bring many losses: relationships, trust in our bodies, time, and the understanding of our own experiences. When we begin to process trauma, we may also have to face losses that other people cannot see.
You use the term “living goodbyes.” What does it mean to grieve someone who is still alive?
I use “living goodbyes” to describe the loss of someone who was once part of your life, often because of abuse, abandonment, or neglect. The person is still alive, but the relationship may no longer be safe or possible in the way it once was.
Some people choose to stay in the relationship, but with significant boundaries. They may have to keep processing what that person cannot offer them, and what the relationship can realistically become. That grief can resurface at different points in life.
Others have no choice. They may be abandoned, or they may reach a point where they cannot keep the person in their life. Sometimes it is a mixture of both.
There can be so many unanswered questions, "Why can’t I be loved? Why can’t this be different?" Beneath those questions is often the pain of an unmet need and the wish that things could have been otherwise. That uncertainty can make a living loss especially painful.
Your forthcoming book explores disenfranchised grief. What is it, and why does it matter?
Disenfranchised grief is grief that is not widely recognised or accepted by society. There can be moral judgment attached to it, which leaves people feeling that they are not allowed to grieve or that they have to choose which parts of their experience deserve to be mourned.
For example, someone may grieve the end of a relationship that other people judge, or the death of someone who caused them harm. Children may experience disenfranchised grief after a pet dies, when their parents divorce, or when they experience estrangement, abandonment, adoption, addiction, or the death of a loved one.
These experiences are different, but they can all raise the same question, "What does grief look like for this person, and how can we make room for it?" When pain is not recognised, people can feel profoundly alone in it.
“Pain unseen is the absolute loneliest thing in the world.”
How can someone take responsibility for the pain they have caused without becoming overwhelmed by shame?
We all grow up within family patterns. Sometimes we cause pain without seeing its full impact, because what is familiar to us can feel normal. That does not mean we were meant to know. But when someone tells us they have been hurt, we have an opportunity to understand what happened, repair what we can, and witness their pain.
Some people can receive difficult feedback from someone close to them; others find it much harder. Having a supportive person in your life - a “stronger, wiser other” - can help you face that feedback without being swallowed by shame. If you don’t have someone like that, therapy can offer support.
Without that kind of support, shame can get in the way of repair. A person may care deeply about the relationship and want to make things right, yet feel unable to face the grief and pain involved. The support of another person can help make that work possible.
What does “accepting the apology never given” mean - and what doesn’t it mean?
When we want an apology, we often want the person who caused the harm to acknowledge our suffering. That recognition matters, especially if we are trying to repair the relationship.
Accepting the apology never given does not mean offering someone a free pass, pretending the harm did not happen, or saying that an apology is unimportant. It means finding your voice and standing by your own story, even if the other person does not see it as you do.
Their inability to acknowledge what happened can give you information about what boundaries you need. If repair is not possible, your healing does not have to wait for the other person to understand, admit, or make amends.
Can the way we attach to others change as we grow older?
Yes. Whatever your attachment style was in childhood, it can be rewritten and rewired through later relationships. That might happen with a close friend or a romantic partner.
If you feel that you do not have anyone you can rely on, you can look for support through community and other relationships. We are wired for connection and belonging, and those connections can become an important resource as we move through difficult experiences.
You’ve spoken about dignity as something that can protect us, but can also keep us stuck. How does that happen?
Dignity is, at its core, about worth and holding fast to what we know is true about ourselves. When we cannot see our true selves reflected in another person’s experience of us, we often get stuck trying to prove our worth.
I once heard a trainer describe a case from his work in another country - a scenario many can identify with. It involved a woman who was experiencing intimate partner violence. Although her abusive partner eventually left, it was under circumstances she had not expected. She followed her former partner to another country to try to win them back, only to experience the same abuse. This time, however, she chose to leave.
For her, dignity meant, "You are not going to abandon me. I’m going to decide when this ends". That sense of dignity helped her find her voice. But sometimes holding tightly to dignity can make it difficult to choose safety or choose yourself. The question is where dignity is helping you - and where it may be making it harder to move towards what you need.
What does the courage to heal ask of us?
Healing asks us to look at the grief we have been carrying and the ways it has held us back. It may mean setting boundaries that protect vulnerable parts of ourselves. It may also mean choosing our own healing, even if that changes or costs us a relationship.
That can be frightening, especially for people who have spent a long time caring for or protecting others. But courage can exist alongside fear. The people who respect your boundaries can support you as you move through that process. If someone cannot, you may have to consider how close you can keep them in your life.
Sometimes the choice is between facing the living loss of another person and continuing a long goodbye to yourself. Facing grief can be painful, but it can also bring a sense of freedom.
What do you hope people take away from your work and your book?
I have often heard people say, “I don’t think I can heal from that,” or, “Healing isn’t for me.” Sometimes society reinforces that idea by treating the pain as an individual problem.
I want people to know that it isn’t a “you problem.” People can heal at any age, given the right context and support. The process looks different depending on someone’s age, stage of life, and what they need. Some people are ready to work through one part at a time; others feel able to take on more. Both are okay.
My book, "If You Leave Me Tomorrow", is a heartfelt glimpse at disenfranchised grief and loss from a child’s perspective. It aims to teach both young and old that, by facing our pain and deepest fears, we can still hold on to the moments, places, and people we love. Ultimately, love transcends pain. It includes a resource for caregivers, with guidance on how to support a child through their pain and grief.
You’ve said that we cannot take away the pain of life, but we can hold it. What does that look like?
Pain gives us information about our system. We naturally want relief, and relief matters. But it is also important to find the source of the pain and allow it to move through us.
It can be difficult to sit with another person’s pain, especially when we want to help them feel better. But healing happens through connection: when someone can reflect our experience back to us and show us that they understand.
That applies to children as well as adults. When we can sit with our child’s sadness, anger, or fear, we help them learn to look towards their emotions rather than away from them. We must first be able to sit with our own emotions and heal the parts of ourselves that need attention so that we can be present with our children.
When I work with clients, I consider whether I have earned the right to hold their pain. Trust may take time. Only after I have earned the right to hold it can I earn the right to challenge it. We often want to reassure people or tell them that everything will be okay. Sometimes what they need first is simply for someone to stay with them in what they are feeling. Our children need this too: we must earn the right both to sit with their pain and to challenge it.
For someone carrying a grief they don’t know how to name, what is one gentle first step?
Start by acknowledging that there may be something in your life you need to look at. You might want help with it, and you do not have to look at it alone.
That first step can feel like the hardest one. When it does, remember that it can also be an act of courage.
Christie Frenette’s work is a reminder that healing does not mean erasing pain or waiting for someone else to acknowledge it. It begins when we are able to name what we have lost, find support, and allow ourselves to be witnessed in that experience. Through her work with individuals and families, and her forthcoming children’s book, "If You Leave Me Tomorrow", Christie helps make space for grief that is often unseen, reminding us that healing is possible and that we do not have to face it alone.
For more information, visit Riptide Counselling's website or follow them on Instagram and Facebook.
