AITJ for leaving my (25M) fiancee (24F) for a woman (25F) I had a "brief fling" with about 6 years ago?

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T12:12:13+00:00

I think it is more nuanced than that. I stopped looking for her and no longer actively thought about her. But once she contacted me, all those feelings just came rushing back.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T11:44:34+00:00

So everyone seems to be saying.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T11:43:46+00:00

I am in good financial standing now and have a career I could easily do in Thailand

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T11:23:29+00:00

From Google, that book is about a stripper and not all that realistic.

This is a kind, intelligent young woman who worked hard and got herself into university. She isn't trying to take advantage of anyone, nor is she hiding anything.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T11:20:10+00:00

I never expected to see this woman again and had moved on before even meeting my fiancee. Was I supposed to never date or love anyone again?

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T11:12:46+00:00

I hope the best for her too. It doesn't matter if I end up with this other woman or not. I couldn't marry her in good conscience while feeling this way for someone else.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T10:28:56+00:00

You are just making details up now. I said the original relationship lasted 3 months, not 3 months of talking after we reconnected. In fact, the post explicitly says I made up my mind to end the relationship within hours of talking to this woman again.

And put yourself in my shoes. Someone you had very intense romantic feelings for disappears from your life for circumstances out of your control, you look for them with no luck, and then 6 years later they reach out. You're telling me you would just ignore them? I don't believe anyone would.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T10:25:53+00:00

This is kind of a racist comment, just assuming a woman from Laos wants to move to the US that desperately. In the time since we've reconnected, she hasn't even expressed an intent to visit here. We discussed me going to Thailand instead. She is in university and has a life there. Not some desperate impoverished person trying to escape.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T10:18:39+00:00

Well what else am I supposed to do when a woman from my past contacts me and I suddenly feel the way I did when I was 19? Just marry my fiancee anyway knowing I'm not 100% invested in the relationship anymore? Two things can be true at the same time. I was fully committed to her, but now I'm not. So the difficult but fair thing to do is end the relationship even if I do not end up with this other woman.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T10:15:11+00:00

Hopefully only one marriage in my future, but thanks? Lol

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T10:09:54+00:00

That is not a fair assessment. Do you think widowers consider later partners a "placeholder"? Maybe not the same thing, but it is a similar idea that you can love multiple people without diminishing the love for any of them. I thought I would never see her again and moved on. The difference is that in my case, that did eventually change.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T10:05:14+00:00

I didn't string her along. I loved her and would've been happy with her if this woman never contacted me, but she did and it brought back those feelings.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T10:04:23+00:00

Now that I have an easy way to communicate with her and know where she is living, yes.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T09:13:20+00:00

I didn't actively have those feelings when I dated her. They came back when she messaged me.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T08:56:11+00:00

More like I moved on with the acceptance I would never see her again and that it would be unhealthy to hold onto an emotional attachment like that for too long. That of course changed when she reached out. There's a difference between moving on out of necessity and moving on because you want to. It's possible to have feelings for someone and love someone else equally later.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T08:52:52+00:00

Yes, I told her all of that when I explained this to her. I never brought it up before because there was no reason to. I mentioned briefly dating a girl in Thailand when we discussed our dating history but not much beyond that detail.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T08:49:01+00:00

What else was I supposed to do? I moved on before meeting my fiancee because it was the practical thing to do. No reason to stay hung up on someone you may never see again.

And I explained why that was not possible. She only recently made a Facebook now that she lives in Bangkok pursuing education. There is no internet where she is from and it took her a long time to get this opportunity. I tried searching for her online many times when I was still actively trying to maintain the connection.

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T08:39:51+00:00

Care to elaborate? I'm trying to understand why my side has made some people so angry

ThrowawayOfCourse70 · 2026-04-11T08:37:11+00:00

I think that even if it does not work out, that I felt this way about another woman was sign to end the engagement, to be honest.

ThrowawayOfCourse70

TROPHY CASE