Why Britney Spears Compared Father Jamie Spears To A ‘Cult Leader’

Pop star Britney Spears spoke at length about her estranged father, Jamie Spears, in her memoir, "The Woman In Me."

It's no secret that Britney, 41, has been estranged from her father, 71, for years, as he acted as the conservator for most of her controversial thirteen-year conservatorship, which lasted from February 2008 to November 2021.

In an excerpt from her memoir, "The Woman In Me," the Princess of Pop calls her father a "cult leader" when she describes how other members of the family never questioned his authority, as per Page Six. She talked about how she was required to go to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings four times a week during her conservatorship because her father thought that she had a "problem" with substance abuse.

After an "exhausting run" of shows during her Las Vegas Residency, Britney said that she wanted to skip one of the meetings to spend time with her two sons: Sean Preston, now 18, and Jayden James, 17. “I had never watched a movie with my kids at home in Vegas. I thought we could pop popcorn and have a nice time together,” Britney recalled, explaining how Jamie told her, "No, you have to go."

The "Toxic" singer recalled turning to her mother for support; however, she alleges that her mother just "looked away." Britney wrote, “At that moment, I started to feel like I was in a cult and my father was the cult leader,” adding, "They were treating me like I was beholden to him.”

The "Overprotected" singer broke down a timeline of events during her conservatorship, which she says consisted of four AA meetings, two hours of therapy, three hours of training a week, fan meet-and-greets, and three shows. Britney said that she "was burned out" by her busy schedule and "wanted to control [her] own destiny."

She also alleged that Jamie had her on a strict diet, which consisted of only chicken and canned vegetables for two years, in order to maintain her weight. “Two years is a long time to not be able to eat what you want, especially when it’s your body and your work and your soul making the money that everyone’s living off of,” she wrote.  “Two years of asking for french fries and being told no. I found it so degrading.”

In addition to being body-shamed by the media, she recalled how she also started being constantly scrutinized by her father during the conservatorship.  “If I thought getting criticized about my body in the press was bad, it hurt even more from my own father. He repeatedly told me I looked fat and that I was going to have to do something about it,” she wrote.

“Feeling like you’re never good enough is a soul-crushing state of being for a child,” she continued. “He’d drummed that message into me as a girl, and even after I’d accomplished so much, he was continuing to do that to me.”

In another excerpt from her memoir released by People magazine, the “Girl In The Mirror” singer said she felt like a “shadow” of herself after thinking about how her father and his associates controlled her during her conservatorship.

“Thirteen years went by with me feeling like a shadow of myself. I think back now on my father and his associates having control over my body and my money for that long and it makes me feel sick,” she wrote.

“Think of how many male artists gambled all their money away; how many had substance abuse or mental health issues. No one tried to take away their control over their bodies and money,” she continued, adding, “I didn’t deserve what my family did to me.”

She went on to say that she "became" a robot during the conservatorship, adding, "But not just a robot — a sort of child-robot. I had been so infantilized that I was losing pieces of what made me feel like myself. The conservatorship stripped me of my womanhood, made me into a child. I became more of an entity than a person onstage. I had always felt music in my bones and my blood; they stole that from me.”

Britney Spears' memoir "The Woman In Me" was officially released on Tuesday, October 24, 2023.