Then he said he took Alison Green's advice — which was that the situation was likely not salvageable, but that his best option was to reach out to Sylvia so she wouldn't be blindsided; acknowledge his mistake; apologize sincerely; and ask her if she'd like to talk about what to do about the situation at hand. But she also warned him that this was probably going to come across as insincere. Here's the LW again: