Many people dream of winning the lottery or striking it rich, but in reality, 70 percent of people who become instantly wealthy squander their money away within a few years.

Nadine grew up poor in Greenwich, Connecticut. At the age of 19, she packed her bags and moved to New York City to pursue her dream of becoming a fashion designer. Nadine started by selling scarves at street fairs and flea markets, and within a few months, she had accumulated more than $60,000 in cash.

This small-town girl's dreams started to become more of a reality after she got married and opened Yoshi, a trendy clothing boutique in New York's SoHo neighborhood.

Within six months, Yoshi was becoming one of the hippest stores in the city and had become quite profitable. Their first year of sales topped $1.2 million, and during their best year, Nadine says they made $2.2 million. "It was amazing how much cash was coming in and also how fast we were spending it," Nadine says.

Nadine and her husband started hanging out with an elite crowd. She says they took extravagant vacations, even paying $500,000 in cash for a new condo, and spending about $1,000 a week in New York's finest restaurants. "I felt like I had arrived," Nadine says. "At the time, it was my dream life."

Nadine, her husband and their three children were living in a beautiful home and enjoying the success of their small boutique…until Nadine's life took a sudden turn.

"I hung out with the beautiful people, and I felt very inadequate," Nadine says. "Like I wasn't up to their level…like the people were going to find out I was a fraud."

That's when Nadine decided to start using drugs. "Cocaine gave me a feeling of strength," she says. "It was a really good feeling in the beginning."

Nadine became a cocaine addict and, she says, developed a $600-a-day habit. She estimates that she spent about $250,000 in one year on drugs. Nadine's husband divorced her and she lost custody of their children.

After the divorce, Nadine says, she began abusing heroin and sleeping on the street. "One of my lowest points was being homeless and living in the New York City subway system in the tunnels and not being able to see my children," she says.

After stints in rehab and in prison, Nadine says she did a lot of work on herself and realized she had been trying to fill a hole in her heart with material things. She says she thought she needed the fancy car, the clothes and the trips to make her happy. "[I didn't realize] that man makes the money, money doesn't make the man," she says.

Since then, Nadine has been picking up the pieces and rebuilding her life. She's been clean for five and a half years. "It was a long, rough road," she says.

She's currently running three clothing boutiques with her sister. The stores are called Purdy Girl, and Nadine does the buying for all three locations. She's also living in an apartment with her children and managing her finances.

"I don't have a lot of extra. I pay my bills, [but] it's tough," she says. "I wouldn't mind having the money that I had back then, but I definitely don't want the lifestyle. I'm so much happier with the way that I am now."