'Sex and the City' author Candace Bushnell regrets not having kids, says she was 'truly alone'
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"Sex and the City" may have left a trailblazing legacy for women on television, but the book's original author now thinks her independent lifestyle may not have been as rewarding.
Candace Bushnell, 60, who wrote the original 1997 novel which spawned the successful TV series for HBO, opened up to Sunday Times Magazine about her 2012 divorce, admitting it made her realize how not starting a family made her feel "truly alone."
"When I was in my 30s and 40s, I didn’t think about it," she recalled. "Then when I got divorced and I was in my 50s, I started to see the impact of not having children and of truly being alone. I do see that people with children have an anchor in a way that people who have no kids don’t."
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Bushnell first rose to prominence with a dating column in The New York Observer, whose writings were anthologized in her "Sex and the City" novel. The series' main character, Carrie Bradshaw (played by Sarah Jessica Parker), was created as a fictionalized version of Bushnell.
In 2012, Bushnell divorced from her ex-husband, ballet dancer Charles Askegard, after 10 years of marriage. Elsewhere in the interview, she claims that the split caused her to go without sex for five years.
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"It's not that long when you get to my age. I know women who have gone longer," she told the outlet.
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Bushnell, who is now dating real estate agent Jim Coleman, is preparing to release a new book, titled "Is There Still Sex in the City?" The book, which drops in August, deals with what Bushnell calls "middle-aged sadness," along with the new obstacles women face once they turn 50. And according to Deadline, the heavily anticipated book is already being adapted into a television series.
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The novel follows a group of middle-aged New York City women who travel to the Hamptons in order to find a fresh start. In a recent interview with the New York Post, Bushnell reveals the novel was inspired by her real-life relocation to the Hamptons, alongside several of her friends.
"We’re all single women without children. And you think about, what are you going to do when you get old?” she said. “If you don’t have kids, you realize, ‘Who is going to take care of me?’ Your girlfriends."
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She elaborated on her new digs, claiming that her experiences in the Hamptons are comparable to her life in NYC back in the day, where all her friends lived within an earshot of each other.
"It was a weird, great communal living where your best friends who are like your family are right across the street and you can run and see them any time and you’re there for each other," Bushnell said. "We live within walking or biking distance [of each other]. We get together usually for Sunday brunch. And sometimes we have a paddle-boarding lunch."