Apologizing to your mom without adding “but you also” is a skill most adults still haven’t learned.

Two words can undo an entire apology. Adding them turns an admission into an opening move, and the other person now has to defend themselves instead of accepting what you said. They may well also be in the wrong, and that conversation can happen later, separately, on its own terms. Mixing the two means neither one lands.

Apologise for exactly your part this week and then stop talking. No context, no proportions, no mention of what they did first. It will feel unfinished and slightly unfair, and the conversation will still go better than the version with the excuse bolted on.