Breaking up is hard to do -- but it can be great for your craft.

Deana Carter exploded onto the country music scene with the virginal Strawberry Wine, a song about first love and the loss of innocence.

Her profile was further bolstered with her 1996 debut album Did I Shave My Legs for This?, which produced four Top 10 hits. But shortly after the 1998 release of her second album, Everything's Gonna Be Alright, her career hit the brakes.

Now, after a couple of broken relationships -- she got released from her record deal at Capitol and she divorced Chris DiCroce -- Carter says she's learned and grown enough to give fame and the music industry another stab.

She's back with a mature new album I'm Just a Girl.

"I didn't realize how long I'd been gone until I heard things like, 'comeback record' and 'comeback tour.' I was making music, so I didn't feel I was away," Carter tells the Sun.

She also admits she started to see a difference with how the industry treated her.

"What I started noticing was opportunities going away. Like if you don't have a current single you can't do award shows."

Carter blames much of the exile on her old record label and the five different label heads she worked with.

"During that time I was keeping the focus on my right to be creative and my right to be unique.

"In my opinion it's our job to be a team, so when it becomes too one-sided with non-creative people trying to get creative people do one thing or another (it was time to go)," she says.

So Carter and her I'm Just a Girl moved to Arista, where she had the freedom to be herself.

One way that originality shines through is on her unconventional CD cover design -- the fashion magazine inspiration comes from the album's tune Cover of a Magazine.

"I did that with a friend at Kinkos. We did the layout and presented it to the label."

Being so forward is something Carter's learned to do the hard way. "I've been through so much that I'm not afraid to say what I need.

"I'm not afraid of much of anything anymore ... I didn't realize the strength resource I've gained over the last three years."

Much of her rebuilding has happened in her new home city of L.A.

"I've always wanted to live in L.A. ever since I was a kid. I felt like a clean break.

"What I love about L.A. is that it is so diverse ethnically. When you're in the middle of that diversity you realize what makes you unique," says Carter, who grew up in Nashville.

Fans will get the chance to hear Carter's new material at Camrose's Big Valley Jamboree tomorrow.

"We will rock the house; we're looking forward it. I have a whole new lust for life in my shows."