My [16f] mom [47f] was a victim of crime years ago. My boyfriend [17m] just told me he is pretty sure it was his dad [??m]. We're not sure if we should be up front and tell my family or not.

As I said in the title, my mother was a victim of a violent-ish crime almost ten years ago. Basically she was a desk person at a business that was robbed, the robber forced her at gunpoint (the gun turned out to be fake after the fact) to give him cash and he also threatened people inside with a (also fake) bomb.

The robber was caught but it really messed my mom up for a long time. She was afraid to leave the house for a long time, still won't be near anyone with a gun.

She is doing much better, but even now she completely avoids the street where it happened.

My boyfriend and I met right at the beginning of this school year. He can be a little hardheaded, but he is a complete sweetheart and I love him to bits. My family likes him as well, my dad has told him before he is welcome over any time and they get along really well.

My boyfriend's dad is in prison. He told me at some point in our relationship that his dad got in trouble for unspecified stuff and was in jail. His mom divorced his dad and she is super sweet (and reverted their names back to her maiden name) so I didn't feel like I ever needed to know more than that.

Today, boyfriend was over at my house for a barbecue. Mom was chatting with another relative about the robbery she was in, boyfriend kind of stopped talking to me and started listening to what they were saying.

Mom mentioned the name of the place, and my boyfriend broke in "The one on [street]?" And mom confirmed. Boyfriend asked how long ago it was and mom told him the year. Boyfriend dropped the convo and was clearly bothered by something the rest of the day.

When it was time for him to go I walked him out to his car and he told me he had something to tell me. I asked what was up, and he told me he was 99% sure that his dad was the person who robbed my mom.

I wasn't really sure what to say to that, but my boyfriend was very clearly bothered by it. He asked me if I thought he should tell my parents and I told him he wasn't even sure.

Shortly after he left I got a text from him that just said "yep".

He called a little bit later and asked if I thought it would be a good idea for him to tell mom. I honestly didn't know.

There's a chance he and I will last after high school (I know, statistics, you don't need to point it out) and if that happens then it will come out eventually. But is it worth telling her now?

Boyfriend even offered to apologize to my mom, basically just go and tell her he is very sorry for what his dad did to her, etc. Bit we can't decide if that is a good idea or bad one.

Boyfriend is very troubled by finding this out, and I'm really not sure what to tell him or anyone to make him feel better.

Should we tell mom or let it lie? Is the apology a good idea?

TL;DR : Boyfriends dad probably committed a robbery years ago that involved my mom and really traumatized her for a while. Should we tell mom or no?

Submitted May 27, 2019 at 04:19PM by Immediate_Bake http://bit.ly/2WrS5km