I do think that carrying on an ongoing affair is...maybe not worse, but shows a level of commitment to that behavior that I don't quite understand and maybe those people are more likely to cheat again in the future? I don't know.

Good point - I wholeheartedly agree with this.

I also think it's "worse" if you're married (both in terms of transgression magnitude and what it says about your integrity), just because that didn't happen overnight. Even if you decide you need to leave, accept that at some point you respected that person enough to call them your life partner, you have an honest way out of that commitment, and you owe that much. To do otherwise makes a marriage just meaningless paperwork in my mind.

And thanks for sharing your story and related thoughts -- a bunch of it sounded VERY familiar... But in my version, it's 12 years later and the "other guy" who lured me away is now my husband. : )