Pop Princess Britney Spears has revealed a painful detail about her past relationship with ex-boyfriend Justin Timberlake. As shared in her upcoming memoir, The Woman in Me, Spears became pregnant during her relationship with Timberlake but felt compelled to get an abortion. In an exclusive from the book shared with People, Spears wrote that Timberlake was unhappy about the news and felt unprepared for it then.
“It was a surprise, but for me, it wasn’t a tragedy. I loved Justin so much. I always expected us to have a family together one day. This would just be much earlier than I’d anticipated,” Spears wrote, per People. “But Justin definitely wasn’t happy about the pregnancy. He said we weren’t ready to have a baby in our lives, that we were way too young.”
Spears’ ballad “Everytime” was released in 2003, a year after her split with Justin. The music video shows her being hounded by fans and the press, fighting with her male lead, and eventually dying in a hospital where a woman in the room next door has just given birth.
After the recent revelation, fans have speculated that the song isn’t about Timberlake and their breakup, but about Spears’ feelings surrounding her pregnancy and abortion.
Meanwhile, fans are also noting that Timberlake’s songs from the same time period do not paint Spears and their relationship positively. The lyrics to “Cry Me a River,” which was released in 2002, implied that Britney had cheated on him. At the time, he was also disclosing details of their sexual relationship in interviews. People are appalled that despite having treated Britney Spears and Janet Jackson terribly, Timberlake hasn’t seen any repercussions for his actions. After news of Spears’ memoir, Timberlake reportedly said (via an unnamed source) that he wants people to “grow and evolve instead of continuing to bring up the past.”
Spears, who stayed silent for years about this impactful experience, says she “had a lot of therapy to get this book done.” That sounds like growing and evolving to me.
(featured image: screencap)
