To have not responded to this email?

[Eileen101]

I was going through my emails earlier today, deleting old ones, and came across an email from my ex from 2014 that I ignored at the time.

I was in an abusive relationship with him, until I was contemplating leaving and having a discussion with my sister about whether to leave him. He read my messages one day and told me that if I left him, he'd kill me. So I ran with nothing a few days later and went to my mums. This was in 2012.
We stayed apart and I divorced him circa 2013. I met my boyfriend, now husband, later in 2013.
Ex emailed me in 2014 basically apologising for everything he'd done, wishing me and my family members well, and saying that he hoped I'd forgive him. The email said that he wanted to apologise because he's not well and it might be the last chance he got. He'd moved back to his home country by this point (I think, the adverts at the side of the page were telling me I could transfer money to this country by Western Union, so assumed it had picked up metadata or cookies or however it worked from his IP address).
I ignored it at the time as it was all quite raw, I was happy with my boyfriend, new life basically.
However now that I have re seen that email from a few years ago, I'm wondering if I was unreasonable in not responding.
I assumed at the time that he was trying to guilt me in some way, but now I'm wondering whether he was actually very ill/dying as he indicated in the email.
Should I have responded at the time? Should I have told an ill, possibly dying man I forgave him? Tbh, I'm not sure if I even have. There's nothing I can do now of course, and there's no way I'd rock the boat of my happy family and very different life now, I just feel guilty that he may have gone to his grave waiting to hear from me.
Was I unreasonable?

I wouldn’t give it any more thought honestly

You owe him nothing whether he's dead or alive.

Nope not unreasonable. When you treat people the way he treated you, you don’t have a right to have your guilt lifted down the line with an apology. You owed him precisely NOTHING. YANBU.

YANBU. There is no requirement to forgive anyone regardless of apology. I would also wager that it was purely to make himself feel better rather than a genuine desire to make amends.

You owe him nothing at all. He could rot in hell for all I'd care. Quite possibly it wasn't even true and just a manipulation tactic.

Please don’t worry about not contacting him for another second, you did exactly the right thing at the time by ignoring his email.x

It was probably lies : his last one chance for you to go back to him

You wanted to kill you . Keep remembering that

Dying is no excuse to be an asshole. We will all be "dying" one day.

Quite possibly it wasn't even true and just a manipulation tactic.

I hadn’t thought about that and you could well be right.

I think there was a reason you didn't respond at the time.

We do tend to forget some things from our past, how you were feeling in response to getting this email is likely one of them.

I would delete the email.

Delete the email and free yourself completely from his ties. You were absolutely reasonable to ignore that message, it was his way of trying to reconnect with you and would have been potentially dangerous to respond.

He threatened to kill you! You have nothing to feel guilty about.

As a pp said we will all be dying one day.
If he had killed you do you think it's likely your family would have forgiven him or would have owed him forgiveness?
I'd delete the email and be very proud of yourself for getting away.
I'm another one whose sceptical that he was ever I'll by the way.
Suicide threats and fictional cancer diagnosis are fairly common abuser tactics to reel their victims back in.

Of curse not, it was likely just a big hook to sucker you back in. Block and delete!

Of course you’re not unreasonable. You don’t owe him an audience just because he apologises.

You did the right thing to ignore. Dying or deceiving, he does not deserve your forgiveness.

My abusive ex did this. He thought he was dying and as I rushed him to hospital, for the first time ever he apologised for treating me the way he had. After he came home and wasn't dying, I brought it up asking if he really meant it. He went ballistic and accused me of upsetting him when he wasn't well.

I realised then the apology wasn't to make me feel better (which an apology is all about) but he wanted my forgiveness so the he would feel better.

Delete and don’t give him a second though. You could be potentially forgiving a sick man. However if he was sick wouldn’t he be dead by now? Or does he mean mentally ill?

You could potentially be putting yourself back into the orbit of an abuser who means you harm. It’s not worth the risk.

If you need closure write a letter, then burn it!

It’s nice to read you found happiness.

We're all nosey and all want resolutions to unfinished business, however, overusing metaphors 'let sleeping dogs lie'.

social media stalk if you must but don't make contact

Even if he is dead, which I doubt, it doesn’t change the person he was.

Probably trying to hoover you back in. You owe him nothing. Delete the email and forget about it

Ignore the hoover. Mine did this too. I ignored it and feel precisely 0 fucks of guilt. That's the way to go.

You were not unreasonable then and please, please don't give it any headspace now.

I think it is the consequence of being an abusive person if he did go to his grave waiting to hear from you.

You dont owe him forgiveness. You have the right to not respond to any communication. Threatening to kill you is a total deal breaker. Even his last email was all on his terms wasnt it? - now he was ready to be forgiven by you, regardless of how you may feel. Dont feel bad. You owe him nothing.

You really feel guilty about a man who threatened to kill you? What on earth are we teaching women that they still feel this way?