Britney Spears has continued to open up about her former relationship with Justin Timberlake, this time explaining that the former NSYNC member broke up with her over a text message.
The singer, 41, made the revelation in her upcoming memoir, The Woman in Me, which will be released on 24 October. In an excerpt obtained by the New York Times, Spears wrote about how the breakup affected her after their three-year relationship.
According to the memoir, the 2002 breakup left her “devastated” and she had even considered leaving the music industry entirely during that time. Spears wrote about how the separation didn’t even seem to phase Timberlake. “I was comatose in Louisiana, and he was happily running around Hollywood,” she wrote, according to the NYTimes.
She reflected on the moment she first watched Timberlake’s “Cry Me a River” music video, which has been speculated to be about her. Spears described the video as featuring “a woman who looks like me cheats on him and he wanders around sad in the rain.”
In the wake of their breakup, Spears believed she was portrayed in the media as “a harlot who’d broken the heart of America’s golden boy,” despite claiming that they had both been unfaithful. She explained in her memoir that she felt forced by both her father and management team to do an interview with Diane Sawyer, in which she was continuously asked about Timberlake and what she did to cause him “so much pain”.
In the memoir, the “Oops I Did It Again” singer confirmed the longtime rumour that she was unfaithful during her relationship with Timberlake. According to the NYTimes, Spears revealed that she kissed her choreographer Wade Robson, but she suggested that it was because Timberlake was unfaithful first.
Spears also discussed her decision to get an abortion after becoming pregnant with Timberlake’s baby during their relationship. “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” she wrote about the pregnancy. “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.”
While opening up about her decision to get the abortion, she implied that she did so because the NSYNC frontman had wanted her to. “I’m sure people will hate me for this, but I agreed not to have the baby. I don’t know if that was the right decision,” she wrote in the excerpt. “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.”
“To this day, it’s one of the most agonising things I have ever experienced in my life,” Spears said.
The Woman in Me will be released on 24 October in the US and UK.
The Independent has contacted representatives for Timberlake for comment.
