I (29F) walked out on my ex-fiancé (29M) and completely ghosted him for 5 years… He wants to talk but I don’t know if it’s a good idea.

My dad became an abusive alcoholic when my mom died. I was lucky enough to be accepted into a school far away from him, so I moved away as soon as I was 18. I met my fiancé here and we got engaged a year after we graduated. I never told my dad about him because he made it clear he wouldn’t tolerate me dating anyone.

My dad did remarry a year after my mom died and his wife and stepkids are just as awful as him. They found me on social media and saw pictures of my fiancé and immediately told my dad. He lost it and told me he would hurt my little sister if I didn’t break it off with him and come home. He gave me very specific instructions on how he wanted me to do it too or he would hurt her. I was terrified for my sister, so I did what he said. I can’t really describe how much of an awful person I feel like for doing that to him. He was absolutely wonderful, and I just left and ghosted him without any warning.

My sister turned 18 this year, my dad wouldn’t let her apply to college or anything because he thought she would turn into a wh*re like me. He found out she was secretly dating someone already anyway and lost it worse than when he found out I was engaged. We ended up leaving that night and coming to stay with a friend of mine because I genuinely think he would’ve killed her if we stayed any longer.

This was a month ago and my friend slipped up and told my ex I was back in the city and staying with her. He now wants to meet up and thinks I should give him answers for what I did 5 years ago. I know he’s right and I do owe him an explanation. The problem is I’m worried about doing more harm than good to him.

My friend filled me in on what happened after I left, and I really almost destroyed everything he’s worked for. He started a business whilst we were in college and it was doing really well but after I left, he became depressed and almost lost everything. His family had to step in to keep it from failing and he only really started to rebuild his life in the last two years. I don’t want to hurt his progress. He's also starting to move on and is casually dating again and I don’t want to make him feel guilty about that either.

I want him to be happy and I don’t want to hurt the progress he’s made but my friend says I owe him a conversation and I know I do. I’m not sure if I should just lie so he hates me or if I should be honest with him. I don’t want him to feel obligated to forgive me either because I know what I did was shitty. Please help. What do I say to him?

TL;DR – My abusive dad threatened to hurt my sister if I didn’t break off my engagement with my fiancé and move back home. I did it but he has become even more abusive over time and I think he might’ve killed or seriously hurt my sister, so we left for good. I moved in with a friend who let it slip to my ex-fiancé that I’m back. My ex now wants to talk about what happened and I don’t know what to say to him.

Submitted December 28, 2020 at 09:43AM by ThrowRAghostedex https://ift.tt/34ScthA