Britney Spears’s hotly anticipated memoir, The Woman In Me, will be released next week, and some excerpts have already got everybody talking.
On Tuesday, People magazine revealed that in her book, Britney confirms that she fell pregnant while dating Justin Timberlake in the early '00s — but she had an abortion because he “didn’t want to be a father.”
Britney and Justin first started dating when they were 18 years old, back in 1999. They split in 2002, and the way that Justin publicly vilified his ex after the breakup has been heavily criticized in recent years.
Per People, Britney writes in her memoir that the unplanned pregnancy was a “surprise” to her, but not “a tragedy.” She adds: “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.”
“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,” Britney explains. “If it had been left up to me alone, I never would have done it. And yet Justin was so sure that he didn’t want to be a father."
The star goes on to say that having an abortion remains “one of the most agonizing things” that she has ever experienced in her life.
And this revelation has really struck a chord with fans, with Justin now facing even more scrutiny for the way that he treated Britney post-breakup.
If you need reminding, just months after the split, Justin released his second solo single, “Cry Me A River,” which heavily suggests that Britney cheated on him. In the song, Justin sings: “You don't have to say what you did / I already know, I found out from him.”
“The bridges were burned / Now it's your turn to cry,” he goes on, before repeating: “Cry me a river.”
And the music video for the song leaned into mounting speculation that it had been inspired by Britney as it featured an uncanny lookalike of Justin’s famous ex, leaving many convinced that she had been unfaithful to him.
The following year, Britney released her album In The Zone, which features the song “Everytime” which was released as a single in 2004.
At the time, many believed that this song was Britney’s apology to Justin for cheating on him, with lyrics such as: “I may have made it rain / Please forgive me / My weakness caused you pain / And this song's my sorry.”
But news of Britney’s secret abortion has shed some new light on “Everytime,” with many becoming convinced that the emotional song is actually Britney’s reflection on her and Justin’s decision to not go ahead with the pregnancy.
The track’s melody and opening piano music is incredibly reminiscent of a lullaby, and in the chorus, Britney literally repeats: “I guess I need you, baby.”
“Every time I see you in my dreams / I see your face it’s haunting me / I guess I need you baby,” she sings. Britney later says: “I make believe that you are here / It’s the only way that I see clear.”
“What have I done? You seem to move on easy,” she goes on, which some have interpreted to be Britney’s way of questioning how Justin was able to easily move on from their choice to have an abortion while she had her regrets.
“At night I pray that soon your face will face away,” Britney later sings.
And the fact that “Everytime” is one of the first tracks that Britney had full creative control over in her career makes this theory all the more poignant, with the star previously explaining during an interview with Hip Online: “I wrote the whole thing from scratch on the piano. Musically there was no track or anything.”
“I was just at my house and I did the whole thing by myself,” she added, before going on to share her relief that her producer, Guy Sigsworth, was happy to let her keep control over the song’s sound.
“I just basically told him exactly how I wanted the song to sound, and he was so amazing because there's a lot of producers, you tell them things and they don't get it,” Britney said. “He got it just right, he was amazing. And so that song specifically, you know, I did everything.”
Britney’s abortion also gives the music video for “Everytime” a whole new meaning, with it showing Britney struggle with suicide ideation and then watching a baby be born in a hospital after she'd seemingly died by suicide in a bathtub.
While the video ends with Britney emerging from the water alive and well, the final shot is a close-up of a newborn wrapped up in a pink blanket in a hospital room.
Reacting to the new information, one person tweeted on Tuesday: “So, Britney Spears’ Everytime is actually a llullaby for her unborn child with Justin Timberlake. This makes the meaning of the song a whole lot different now. She's drowning herself to be with her baby; that's my interpretation of the song & MV.”
So, Britney Spears’ Everytime is actually a lullaby for her unborn child with Justin Timberlake. This makes the meaning of the song a whole lot different now. She's drowning herself to be with her baby; that's my interpretation of the song & MV. pic.twitter.com/ieMmosGvgK
“The Everytime instrumental sounding like a lullaby, the ''I guess I need you baby'' part, a baby in the music video. This song explores her feelings of guilt surrounding her abortion,” someone else agreed.
Another wrote: “Everytime by Britney Spears has such a new meaning now. It being a lullaby saying how she needs her baby.”
“i always felt like everytime wasn't just about justin or their break up the lyrics always felt a little bit too heavy to be just about breaking up with someone to me,” one more said. “i could have never imagined it could be about an abortion ill never listen to the song the same way.”
i always felt like everytime wasn't just about justin or their break up the lyrics always felt a little bit too heavy to be just about breaking up with someone to me i could have never imagined it could be about an abortion ill never listen to the song the same way
And somebody else pointed out that while abortion isn’t always a difficult decision for somebody to make, nor a choice that they will come to regret or feel guilty about, Britney’s incredibly religious upbringing could have been a contributing factor to her internal battle over the situation.
The star was born in Mississippi, which is part of the United States’s so-called “Bible Belt,” where socially conservative evangelical Protestantism has an incredibly strong influence. Britney was raised as a Southern Baptist and was active in her church growing up.
In recent years, Britney has said multiple times that she stopped believing in God during her controversial conservatorship.
“The whole abortion thing and the Everytime video makes SO MUCH sense if you understand how religious Britney was raised and I’m sure how looked down upon abortion was for her until she came to Hollywood,” one person tweeted.
The whole abortion thing and the Everytime video makes SO MUCH sense if you understand how religious Britney was raised and I’m sure how looked down upon abortion was for her until she came to Hollywood #TheWomanInMe
Britney went on to have two sons, Sean Preston and Jayden James, with her ex-husband Kevin Federline. Kevin has full custody of the boys, and they recently relocated to Hawaii.
