"It's very expensive to end a marriage."

I'm a Southern California-based writer on the Lifestyle team who likes to try and rank viral foods and read and recommend awesome books.

"She backed off when I told her I was married, and we stayed friends. I continued to struggle with working out my relationship with my wife, but the woman and I eventually crossed that platonic boundary. At that point, I felt I owed it to myself to think about my happiness for a change. It was really hard to even think about sleeping with someone who wasn't my wife, but I made myself go through with it to create some emotional separation from her. My affair was with an older woman who was divorced, very attractive, and not looking for anything serious after years in an abusive marriage. It was surreal the first time, but it became easier, and it went on for about six months before I ended it. It may sound messed up, but I genuinely think it was a good decision for me. Eventually, my wife and I went to marriage counseling, and we talked all of this out. It was good for her to learn about my affair as well because she stopped taking me for granted, and for the first time, it occurred to her that she could lose me. We worked through it, eventually got back to being happy, and had two more kids. We've been married 33 years now."

"From my experience, affairs don't just happen by accident; they're led by something. In hindsight, I was incredibly unhappy for years. An affair wasn't the solution, but it was a little bit of happiness in an otherwise very lonely time in my life."

Note: Some submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.