I am one of those absolutely-crazy-about- Sex-and-the-City girls. I own each season and have watched every episode at least six times (and probably watched seasons two & three completely through over ten times). I have turned many non-believers into serious addicts (including my boyfriend who absolutely adores Samantha even more than I do now). I’m obviously excited for the movie and plan on wearing spectacular pink feathered Valentino heels (complete with bow and little Swarovski crystals) on opening night.

When I first moved to the city (just over four years ago), I would burst out of my apartment in full Carrie-inspired outfits. I wore every pair of shoes I had and happily spent my entire savings account in about three months flat, while shopping on 5^th. I lied to my parents about my job search (which I didn’t really start until month three) and lived blissfully in denial, pretending I would magically fall into a career writing, even though I had never really written before.

It was all so romantic and perfect until things came crumbling down and I realized I had no way to pay my rent or all of my skyrocketing credit card bills. I accepted an unpaid pr intern position with Showroom Seven (and was genuinely ecstatic about it at the time) and then walked into the Hard Rock Café (where I waitressed during college) and immediately picked up a full time job working evenings. I worked nearly 80 hours a week and ended up living on only one pack of ramen a day, for at least two months because it was only 20 cents a day.

One day (that I’ll never forget), I sat with my back against my stove and stared into my open closet at all of the beautiful things I bought on credit while in college and thought, ‘my lady Dior bag would cover rent for a month and a half; those Prada heels would buy 2,800 packs of ramen; I hate that I love all of this stuff so much because otherwise I could just sell it.’ Then I cried because I was truly hungry – and I’m not exaggerating on this point. And the saddest thing is that whenever I talked to my parents, I would tell them that everything was fine because I was too ashamed to ask for their help and admit that picking up and moving to New York all by myself without any plans wasn’t really working the way I thought it was going to.

Thank god I got through all of that and can now look back at it fondly (although I’m still no where near owning my own brownstone in the West Village, complete with a huge walk-in closet filled with Manolos). But what is truly amazing about all of this is that I know so many other people who can relate to this story, who have gone through similar times, and who are still eternally grateful to little Miss Bradshaw and the inspiration we found in each and every episode of SATC to just go out there and live our dreams, even if we did nearly kill ourselves in the process.