A sneak peek at Britney Spears’ memoir, “The Woman in Me”

One thing about Britney Spears is that she’s gonna make headlines. The “Princess of Pop” has been in and out of the news – especially over the past couple of years, as she publicly battled her conservatorship. Now, Britney’s back with her first memoir, and it’s already making waves.

“The Woman in Me” is hitting shelves on Tuesday, October 24, after months of leaks and rumors on what might be inside. With early copies already pored over by reviewers, here’s what we know about the book so far.

A good chunk of the memoir is about the 13-year conservatorship that Spears experienced. Her finances and even physical autonomy were under the control of her father, James Spears, from 2008 through 2021. In 2008, Britney had gone through very public mental health challenges, which led to this arrangement. In the book, she describes suffering under the conservatorship. 

She says, “This is what’s hard to explain, how quickly I could vacillate between being a little girl and being a teenager and being a woman, because of the way they had robbed me of my freedom. The woman in me was pushed down for a long time." Spears recalls going along with it out of the fear of being separated from her two sons.

She also explores the pressure, sexism and exploitation that she experienced as a young female artist. Spears describes feeling uncomfortable when asked invasive questions about her body or her high-profile relationships by interviewers.

Apart from addressing those very difficult topics, Spears delves into her experiences as a hyper-celeb. In the public eye since childhood, she’s had some very exposed relationships, friendships and feuds. Madonna, Natalie Portman, Lenny Kravitz, Oprah, Mariah Carey, Donatella Versace, Cher, Mel Gibson and even Robin Williams all get name-dropped. She also tells stories involving Christina Aguilera, Rachel McAdams and Colin Farrell. 

One bombshell that Spears includes in her book is the abortion she got while dating Justin Timberlake. “Justin definitely wasn’t happy about the pregnancy,” she writes. “He said we weren’t ready to have a baby in our lives, that we were way too young. If it had been left up to me alone, I never would have done it.” 

Fortunately, many of the celebrities Spears mentions were a positive light for her during her conservatorship. For example, she writes that Paris Hilton was “one of the people who was kindest to me when I really needed kindness … she encouraged me to have fun for the first time in a long time.”