Soulmate aspiration and BFF

I'm having another issue with this aspiration. I got through what's mentioned in the OP just fine, now she's on level two and cannot progress. One of the requirements is stupid...you have to "apologize to spouse when they are angry", so, my sim had to insult her soulmate to make him angry (because I don't know of any other way to both make him angry and give her something to apologize for), then apologize. However she has enough charisma that the apologize option is now called "smooth apology", I had her do that a couple times but the goal never completed. I don't know if it's because the apologize option is named something else now, or what? I even tried resetting her, twice, and reloading the save.
So, either my game is glitching out, or this particular aspiration is borked... *sigh*, could really be either, I'm thinking it's time to start a new save because lots of wonky things have been starting to happen.