Did Carrie Bradshaw from Carrie and Big’s relationship was stormy and dramatic, but it was also relatable to many fans since the issues between them were realistic.
Carrie loyalists, of course, claim that after meeting Big, Carrie became less empowered and cultivated some major insecurities, since she never felt good enough for him. In fact, many things went bad for her once she met Mr. Big.
Her Self-Esteem Was Never The Same
To be fair, it wasn’t possible for Big to know how acutely he affected Carrie and how she was more invested in their relationship than he was. However, each of Carrie’s attempts at reconciling with Mr. Big and sustaining a healthy, monogamous relationship with him wrecked her sense of confidence because Big never seemed to want stability, and it left Carrie questioning things about herself.
Each time they’d break up it would leave Carrie quite emotionally scattered, so much so that Carrie referred to herself as a masochist for running back to Big each time.
She Became Quite Obsessive
In a noteworthy scene in season 2, Carrie’s friends hold an impromptu low-key intervention for her at brunch to get her to stop "whining" about Big. It’s important to note that usually, Carrie loves leaving some room in any relationship so the dynamic can naturally take its course. This is true unless she’s with Big, with whom she has quite a few insecurities, most likely because she can never get over him.
She wouldn't follow anyone else to church or look for someone at almost every party. Carrie turned quite obsessive and consumed by proving how she was better off without Big after their breakup and it became quite evident that she was still reeling from their split.
She Was Left At The Altar
Mr. Big stood Carrie up at the altar in the SATC movie and it took Carrie almost a year to get over the incident. It was a brutal shock to her because she was living with Big at the time and had received no signs that he was getting cold feet.
One could see why Big was paranoid, but considering his history of hurting Carrie, he certainly owed her more. After the traumatic incident, Carrie did get a fresh start, but she didn't have much of a love life, since she obviously had trust issues.
She Became A Self-Contradictory Writer
Her on-again, off-again relationship with Big actually took a toll on her faculties as a writer. Carrie was a relationship columnist and most of her pieces would be inspired by the ups and downs in her personal relationships or observations. After her first split with Big, Carrie’s train of thought, especially the ones she put down on paper, began contradicting each other. A piece can of course present conflicts of the writer, but Carrie’s pieces started coming off as really unreliable and rudderless.
Carrie’s advice was all over the place, especially seen in the episodes that featured Mr. Big. She would be advocating the single life one moment and the very next moment she would be asking single women to put effort into finding men or questioning the merits of being alone.
Big Made Her Look Like The Bad Guy In The Relationship
It’s funny that Carrie actually broke up with Big more times than he broke up with her. Many fans pointed out that Big often gaslit Carrie and basically lacked the emotional intelligence to understand that he was making her insecure, so he would effectively push her towards a breakup or a meltdown so she had to do the messy work.
A good example would be when he invited Carrie to a friendly lunch to tell her that he was engaged to another woman, only five months after their breakup. This shocked Carrie because Big had insisted that during their time together that commitment was not his thing. It was also careless of Big to invite Carrie to lunch to tell her a piece of news that would obviously wreck her emotionally and lead to a showdown.
She Couldn’t Fully Appreciate Any Other Relationship
A good example of this is Carrie's relationship with Aidan, which was healthy and actually helped Carrie grow since Aidan complemented her emotionally and intellectually. But since Carrie and Big lived in the same city and shared certain social circles, they would often run into each other.
Running into Big each time would mess with Carrie’s emotions since she would reminisce about their past and compare it to her current relationship. The lack of closure was also definitely an issue for Carrie, and never really let her move on in a true sense.
She Started Thinking Less Of Herself
This is not quite the same as Carrie having low self-esteem. Instead, it has to do more with self-perception. Her relationship with Big would often get volatile and make Carrie cynical in broader . She started expecting less from herself as a friend and partner. She also started questioning her every move in relationships, which added to her hang-ups.
Carrie was, at her core, a pretty great partner: she was effervescent, yet reliable and self-aware. Until she was spurned by Big, she had a more dominant sense of self-possession.
She Couldn't Stop Smoking
This is not about happy smokers who are okay with their lot. The fact of the matter is, Carrie hated the fact that she couldn’t give up smoking. It’s common knowledge that Carrie would often smoke when she was in bed with Big, and when they started having an affair behind his wife’s back, Carrie would smoke out of the stress and guilt she felt over their dalliance.
Smoking was her go-to stress-buster, but she wasn't happy about it. Of course, Big isn’t to be blamed for this, but since he was a fellow smoker (Aidan was notably a non-smoker and helped Carrie stop smoking), he obviously enabled her addiction.
She Had To Tip-Toe Around Her Friends
Carrie went through an incredible amount of guilt when she started an affair with the married Mr. Big and the worst part was she could not be upfront with her friends about it. Though she did eventually tell Miranda and Samantha, she could never muster up the courage to tell Charlotte, who had some pretty strong feelings about the sanctity of marriage.
But this is not something Carrie usually did, since her friends are her soulmates and she shares everything with them. But when it came to Mr. Big, there were certain things Carrie could not share with them, since she knew they’d ask her to be cautious or leave him.
Big Made Her Feel Like A Terrible Human Being
One could see why Carrie would feel so bad about having an affair with the married Big - she was positively riddled with guilt and it took over her life. She internalized the sentiment that she was the baddie in the scenario because she was wrecking another woman’s home.
This traumatized her because this is something that’s not in her character and it made her feel terrible about herself as she was repelled by her own actions. After Natasha’s accident, which caused her to lose a tooth, Carrie decided that it was the final straw.