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I'm looking for a good figure of speech to suggest that something is irreversible.
It would be used in the following context: "I'm sorry, dear, but you said you hate her loud and clear, and there is nothing you can do about it now. _______________________________.
I thought of "once said can't be taken back" or "there are three things that cannot be taken back, the spoken word..." but these are not figures of speech.
"You can't put the toothpaste back in the tube."
This idiom was popularized after the release of the White House tapes in connection with the Watergate Scandal of the early 70's, which contained H.R. Haldeman's conversation with Presidential Counsel John Dean. Haldeman tried to dissuade Dean from testifying to the Senate, saying “Once the toothpaste is out of the tube, it’s going to be very hard to get it back in.”
"The cat's out of the bag."
Letting the cat out of the bag refers to accidentally revealing a secret. It has to do with unscrupulous pig sellers swapping out a bagged piglet for a bagged cat - the deception would be revealed when the buyer came home and "let the cat out of the bag."
Personally I like "You can't unring that bell" as deadrat mentioned above. The phrase refers to the fact that you can't un-hear a bell that has been rung. There's a nice essay about its history here:
Unring the Bell (impossibility of taking back a statement or action)
You can't unscramble an egg, dictionary.com
Some processes are irreversible
This, and almost any answer, will be a variant on the Second Law of Thermodynamics. See Hmolpedia for entropy, putting eggs back together and Boltzman models.
In thermodynamics, you can’t unscramble an egg or a "broken egg can't unite back into a whole egg" are oft-used layperson’s descriptions of the either entropy, the second law of thermodynamics, or the arrow of time.
I like the idiom set in stone. It means an action or event is rigidly unchangeable, and it has a strong connotation. See The Free Dictionary.
Usage:
I can't change my appointment to attend the ball game. It's set in stone.
You cannot turn back the clock.
Return to the past or to a previous way of doing things: we can’t turn the clock back—what’s happened has happened - ODO
This relates to the desire to go back to a point in time to 'undo' the speech.
to cross the Rubicon
to do something which will have very important results, which cannot be changed later — Cambridge Dictionary of American Idioms
EDIT: This idiom most applicable if someone had made a difficult decision from where there is no way back, so may be too specific for OP?
Regarding background :
This high-level idiom comes from an event in ancient Roman history. In 49 BC Julius Caesar's army crossed the Rubicon River, an action that started civil war. It was forbidden for any army to cross the border river, so when Caesar's army did, he knew he was doing something which would have important results that could not be changed later. — http://www.ecenglish.com/learnenglish/lessons/idiom-day-crossing-rubicon
What's done is done
The expression uses the word "done" in the sense of "finished" or "settled", a usage which dates back to the first half of the 15th century
Meaning
It usually means something along the line of: the consequence of a situation (which was once within your control), is now out of your control, that is, "there's no changing the past, so learn from it and move on."
Etymology
One of the first-recorded uses of this phrase was by the character Lady Macbeth in the tragedy play Macbeth by the English playwright William Shakespeare, who said: "Things without all remedy Should be without regard: what's done, is done" and "Give me your hand. What's done cannot be undone. – To bed, to bed, to bed!"Wikipedia
[all] bridges/boats are burned (behind one)
burn one's bridges (behind one)
Fig. to make decisions that cannot be changed in the future. This expression is derived from the idea of burning down a bridge after crossing it during a military campaign, leaving no choice but to continue the march. Figuratively, it means to commit oneself to a particular course of action by making an alternative course impossible. It is most often used in reference to deliberately alienating persons or institutions whose cooperation is required for some action. For instance, "On my last day at my old job, I told my boss what I really think about the company. I guess I burned my bridges."
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs
Burn one's boats
This is a variation of "burning one's bridges", and alludes to certain famous incidents where a commander, having landed in a hostile country, ordered his men to destroy their ships, so that they would have to conquer the country or be killed.
the milk is spilled [, it's no use crying over it]
It's no use crying over spilled milk and Don't cry over spilled milk
Prov. Do not be upset about making a mistake, since you cannot change that now. I know you don't like your new haircut, but you can't change it now. It's no use crying over spilled milk. OK, so you broke the drill I lent you. Don't cry over spilled milk.
that (or the) ship has sailed/the train has left the station/the boat is missed
The opportunity has already passed.
the water is under the bridge
water under the bridge
: something that has happened and cannot be changed.
[There are no do-overs,] you can't un-say what's been said; you can't put the spells back in the book
You can't fix everyone who's broken, and you can't un-say what's been said.
The die is cast.
This is actually what Caesar was reputed to have said when he crossed the Rubicon. He meant 'there's no turning back now'.
To quote from the Wikipedia page:
Alea iacta est ("The die is cast") is a Latin phrase attributed by Suetonius (as iacta alea est [ˈjakta ˈaːlea est]) to Julius Caesar on January 10, 49 BC as he led his army across the Rubicon river in Northern Italy.
“The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.”
Omar Khayyam
It's bit long, but most people will recognise it from just 'The Moving Finger writes;"
"The horse has bolted", "the bird has flown", "the bolt is shot".
The former is often used in the longer phrase to criticise the timing of an otherwise sound action that was done too late "that's shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted".
The latter probably refers to a crossbow bolt, though it could also refer to a door bolt, that is 'shot' across to lock a door closed.
There are many good answers already, but one not included is "The genie is out of the bottle". With a slightly different emphasis, another traditional one is "No use in crying over spilt mik".
Try fait accompli
A thing accomplished and presumably irreversible Or Something that has been done and cannot be changed.
"No take backs."
the command that instructs another party that once they have given you something they cannot change their mind. –Urban Dictionary
A longer expression might be
Once he's fallen, there's no putting Humpty Dumpty together again.
Some people may see this Humpty Dumpty example as being essentially the same as ab2's "you can't unscramble an egg" suggestion—but Humpty Dumpty himself would surely disagree:
“It's very provoking,” Humpty Dumpty said after a long silence, looking away from Alice as he spoke, “to be called an egg—very!”
And speaking of falls, there is also
You can't go back to Eden.
You can't have your cake and eat it too.
"That ship has sailed."
This, I believe, dates back to when getting a ship back to harbor was a significantly more difficult undertaking than reversing course and returning to the dock.
