Do I give up the trip of a lifetime to please my father?

I’ve known my ex-boyfriend for 10 years. I often think he may be the one. He lives abroad, in the same country (let’s say Poland) that my father is from. Recently my ex (for the 3rd or 4th time) offered to pay for me to come visit him.I just needed to pitch in about $400 (the ticket cost 1400). I was really excitied to go for a number of reasons: I haven’t seen my family in “Poland” in over ten years, I haven’t seen my ex in over three, and the deal was affordable.

I planned to stay with one of my aunts. My ex only lives 20 minutes away, so we’d be able to see each other often and easily… and I could avoid feeling like an “international hoe”.

When I told my father I was taking this trip to “Poland” he asked about the price and I thought that was it. I didn’t tell him my ex was helping me pay for it, so he assumed I was paying the entire fare. A few days later he showed me several bills and asked me to cancel my trip in order to help with these bills. He promised to pay me back. The last time I took out a cash advance (over $2000) on a credit card to help him out, he didn’t pay me back, my payements SKY ROCKETED, and my credit went down a little. I took on a second job to deal with my finances and started saving money to move or to do something special, like this trip. I love and respect my dad, I really do- he is one of the smartest and most hardworking men I know. However, I really don’t think this money will solve all his problems. It took me a while to save up, and it’s not much. I suspect that my father genuinely needs the money, but I also think that he doesn’t want me to go because he HATES my ex-boyfriend. I didn’t tell him about the ex, but I’m 100% certain that he figured it out. I honestly feel like I’m giving up the trip of a lifetime to please my father. I’m incredibly sad and bitter about canceling my plans. So should I keep being “Daddy’s Little girl”… or live my life and possibly damage my fragile relationship with my father?