Britney’s father isn’t taking any chances with his daughter’s tenuous mental health. Access Hollywood is reporting that Jamie Spears plans move in with his daughter to ensure that that she is under constant supervision and is protected from the predators and paparazzi that may have hastened her her recent break down.

Access Hollywood’s insider also claims that a guardian who will also serve as a sobriety coach will move in with Jamie and Britney to help ease her transition back to a more calm lifestyle. Britney also suffers from the effects of what is thought to be abuse of prescription medication, much of which could have been forced on her without her knowledge by Sam Lutfi. In Touch reports that she had an “intense detox” while in her padded cell in UCLA’s psych ward, where she was hospitalized for just under a week.

In our earlier post about Britney we asked what was next for her, because her future outside of the hospital looks bleak as long as she continues on her erratic path. Having her father and a sober companion live with her and try to guide her daily decisions may be a very good compromise between hospitalization and complete hotel-hopping freedom.

Britney’s father Jamie works as a chef and said in a court deposition that he was unable to visit his daughter immediately on Sunday when she asked for him due to the fact that he had to cook for a Super Bowl party. At least the guy is working hard and not trying to sponge off his daughter. He was already appointed conservator of her estate and that time, and it speaks well for him that he kept his work commitments. He did visit Britney later at the hospital, and also showed up at the Beverly Hills Hotel last night where she was holed up with Adnan.

It is thought that Britney’s father will be in court today to try and enforce some of his authority as conservator of her estate, including not authorizing hotel stays and deciding which visitors she is permitted.

TMZ is reporting that “Designing Women” actress Delta Burke, 51, has checked herself into a psychiatric hospital for treatment of severe depression, obsessive compulsive disorder and hoarding. TMZ has a clip on their website of Burke’s description of why she decided to check herself into a facility and what mental issues she’s dealing with. Delta talks about trying to get her various medications worked out - which can be an arduous process for people who are only on two prescriptions - and she’s on five. She also mentions that she was as bad as those people you see on television who have stacks of newspapers piled to the ceiling.

The former Designing Women star, 51, is apparently seeking treatment for symptoms of depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder and “hoarding” which on an audio clip provided by TMZ she is heard likening to what is seen in the homes of people who have stockpiled row upon row of newspapers.

“I was on so many medications and they just weren’t working,” Burke is also heard saying on the clip. “I was on five.” Among them, she says are “anti-depressants and stuff.”

[From People]

I really commend Delta for recognizing she has a problem, needs help, and taking action to get it. I can’t imagine anything that would be more frightening than checking into a psychiatric facility. And I would expect that things must have gotten pretty bad for her to do that. Most people know the basics of depression, but few know about hoarding. Wikipedia defines hoarding as:

Compulsive hoarding (or pathological hoarding) is extreme hoarding behaviour in humans. It involves the collection and/or failure to discard large numbers of objects even when their storage causes significant clutter and impairment to basic living activities such as moving around the house, cooking, cleaning, showering or sleeping. Hoarding rubbish may be referred to as syllogomania. A slang term for a compulsive hoarder is pack rat or packrat.

[From Wikipedia]

I dated someone who was a terrible hoarder, and it was truly the most frustrating experience of my life. It was so aggravating to have talks about keeping things clean and normal looking, and then find a box filled with nothing but Styrofoam - just because why throw it out? I would find broken toys, pieces of garbage, Denny’s place mats, empty bottles of Orbitz soda from 1996 (“Because someday it might be worth something!) all carefully hidden to avoid detection. It was really frustrating because he didn’t recognize that it was a problem and was abnormal, unhealthy behavior.

Click here for a great example of a clutter scale. This was put together by psychologists as an example of different levels of hoarding. When you go through picture by picture, you’ll notice a few are out of order, but you can get the idea by looking at the image that shows all the pictures as a whole.

Hoaders often have to make pathways through the crap in their own homes. I was in a home several times that was occupied by an entire family of hoarders. They literally had piles of papers stacked to the ceilings, bags of garbage, dirty blankets, etc. All that bric-a-brac you see people getting rid of at garage sales was stuffed into this house. It basically looked like a Value Village run amok. Everything was old, dingy, and useless.

In an extreme, hoarders can literally save so many things that they are forced to move out of their own homes. They actually choose to do that instead of getting rid of things. Apparently throwing anything away induces a sense of panic. Several studies have shown that hoarding is closely related to obsessive compulsive disorder. A 2004 University of Iowa study found that damage to the brain’s right mesial prefrontal cortex tends to cause compulsive hoarding. The thought is that the part of the brain that helps discern what stuff is and is not important does not function properly in hoarders. Thus they’re not able to logically and rationally determine that saving a napkin from Burger King is less important than saving a monogrammed napkin from your wedding. It really is a miserable and overwhelming way to live. Let’s hope Delta gets good treatment and her issues under control.

Picture Note by JayBird: Here’s a few pictures of rooms in hoarder’s homes.

I’m outraged at the way that US Weekly is handling the Sam Lutfi case now that the news is out about how much of a twisted manipulative person he is. They’ve just posted an article about how Lutfi’s side of the story is going to be the main focus of their cover story all about Britney’s problems. Lutfi repeatedly uses examples and stories to make himself seem like Britney’s savior and like he’s the only one who can help her, when in fact he’s been emotionally abusing her and cutting her off from her friends and family. He disabled all her cars, threw away her cell phone chargers, and admitted to her mother than he routinely mashes up medication and slips it into her food without her knowledge! This man made Britney a prisoner in her own home, and now US Weekly is all too willing to make him out to be the good guy because he’s willing to talk to them. The very serious and seemingly supported allegations against Lutfi are relegated to one sentence in parentheses by US. They barely question him or his motives, and their print article is sure to be as one-sided and idiotically fawning over the man who abused Britney as their Internet version.

Sam Lutfi, who is now on the receiving end of a restraining order imposed by Britney Spears’ parents, was the one person by her side as she unraveled over the past six months.

In the latest issue of Us Weekly, on newsstands now, Spears’ de facto manager and confidant opens up about her bipolar disorder, how he medicated her, what happened the night she was hospitalized, and how her parents reacted.

“In the depressive episodes, it’s all crying,” Lutfi tells Us. “But in the manic episode, there’s very little crying or sympathy or compassion. She becomes another person. She becomes somebody that just doesn’t care about anybody or anything.”

“The British accent is part of the mania,” he adds. “She’ll stick to the British accent because she becomes comfortable with it… But you know, when the pink wig comes on, it’s getting bad.”

Lutfi says that when Spears was involuntarily committed to treatment at UCLA Medical Center on January 31, her mom, Lynne Spears, arrived and tried to remove her daughter from his guidance. “Well, he is better family than you guys will ever be,” Spears responded, according to Lutfi.

Lutfi tells Us that he gave Britney “a handful of pills” before her parents arrived. “I said these pills are working wonders, they are miracle pills,” he recalls. Spears, Lutfi says, agreed that the meds were helping her sleep.

(In their restraining order against Lutfi filed yesterday, Spears’ parents accuse him of drugging their daughter and being verbally abusive. Jamie, who has been named as his daughter’s conservator, “is doing what he has to do to save Britney,” a source tells Us.)

Spears is one of nearly six million American adults suffering from bipolar disorder, a mental illness consisting of extreme shifts in mood, thought, energy, and behavior patterns.

Lutfi, 33, tells Us only he, Spears, and her psychiatrist know what brought on her bipolar disorder “roughly five years ago.”

[From Us Weekly]

Lutfi tells a story about how Britney wrote him a little note when she was taken away, as if that justifies the way he’s tried to keep Britney captive and has been drugging her for months.

I made an anonymous comment on this article, something I rarely bother to do, but there are many more that are much better than mine and people are outraged. One of my favorites is from Michelle, she says:

US Weekly - Stop giving this sick man a voice. Stop letting him speak through your magazine. He is a sick, twisted individual. A liar. Nothing he can say will validate what he’s done. He deserves to be jailed or sued or even better yet killed, and you let him continue spreading his malicious lies. He should have tried to help her, he should be grateful she is getting help if he truly cares about her. Instead he is like a 2 year old who’s angry their toy got taken away. Of course Britney was asking for him, etc. He made her completely dependent on him. He brainwashed her, drugged her, insulted her, encouraged her insanity. She has no idea what she needs or probably even what she’s thinking or saying half the time. And that is his defense? That Britney wants him in her life? And that she hates her parents? Please! She can’t even think straight, he’s made sure of that. I say hang the f*cker in a public place.

What’s more is that one of Britney’s friends, Ken Dungey, commented on the article and mentioned the bragging text messages Sam sent him about how he has total control over Britney, which are now available at Bitten and Bound. Dungey said he had over an hour long telephone interview with a source at US:

US WEEKLY TELEPHONE INTERVIEWED ME LAST WEEK FOR OVER AN HOUR, ALEXIS SAID MY INTERVIEW WOULD BE COMING OUT IN NEXT WEEKS MAGAZINE, I HAVE YET TO HEAR BACK FROM HER.

You can read Dungey’s full story online. He’s a friend of the guy who was harassed mercilessly by Lutfi, who ultimately ended up taking out a restraining order on him. He also knows another woman who Lutfi was sending threatening text messages to.

So US had both sides of the story, but they chose to go with Lutfi’s despite the overwhelming evidence against him. People are calling for criminal charges against this guy. Instead all we get from US is an article about the supposed insider who knows about Britney’s mental illness - a weakness he exploited every way possible to gain control over her and plaster his name all over the media. Shame on you, US. Change your story before it goes to print.

Lutfi is also trying to shop around a high-paid television interview where “he is expected to reveal the star’s darkest secrets.” The only people that should be hearing about Britney’s secrets are his fellow inmates.

Note by Celebitchy: US Weekly has the entire declaration by Lynne Spears supporting the restraining order against Britney’s self-proclaimed manager Sam Lutfi, and the details are disturbing. Lynne’s statement is clear and compelling and makes a strong case for Britney never to see this guy again. After reading this, I think that a lot of her recent issues can be explained by the extreme amount of medication she was on, much of which may have been without her knowledge. The highlights are:

• Lutfi said that he routinely mashes up medication and puts it in Britney’s food
• Lutfi disabled all of Britney’s cars so that she could not leave the house without her permission.
• Lutfi threw out all the chargers to Britney’s cellphones so that she could not use them, and cut the wire for the phone in her house
• Lutfi told Britney she could see her boys on Wednesday if she took the medication he gave her, after which she said “I’ll do anything to get them back.”
• Lutfi bragged to Lynn about the control he has over Britney’s life, and said that “You’d better learn that I control everything. I control Howard Grossman, Britney’s business manger. I control her attorney’s and the security guards at the gate. They don’t listen to Britney, they listen to me. That’s why Jamie was gone tonight.”
• Lutfi said that if Britney’s family cut him out of her life that she wouldn’t take her medication and would kill herself. He said “If you try to get rid of me, she’ll be dead and I’ll piss on her grave.”
• Details of Lutfi’s fight with Britney show how he emotionally abused and berated her, calling her a “piece of trash,” an “unfit mother,” and a “whore.”
• Lutfi tried to get everyone to do tequila shots, and then switched to wine when people declined. Britney refused to drink the wine he offered her and switched hers with her mothers.
• Lynne Spears says she was agitated and unable to sleep that night, and that it seemed very odd to her that she could not sleep. She said she felt like she drank too much coffee.
• Lynne’s friend Jackie, who had wine with them at Lutfi’s insistence, also said that she felt anxious and like she had been drinking coffee.

Here is MSat’s coverage of this very unsettling account by Lynne. If all this is true, it makes Britney seem like the victim in this. If she is taking huge amounts of medication without her knowledge of course she would behave erratically and make poor decisions.

The ugly truth is finally coming about about “friend/manager” Sam Lutfi. In a restraining order filed by Jamie and Lynne Spears against Lutfi, Lynne Spears paints a picture of a mentally unstable and unaware Britney Spears becoming completely reliant upon Lutfi, who, among other things, was in cahoots with the paparazzi, drugged Spears without her knowledge, cut her phone lines, interfered with her custody court hearings, and even disabled the pop star’s vehicles. It sounds as if Lutfi was keeping her prisoner through manipulation and bully tactics. US Weekly has published the entirety of Lynne Spear’s statement on what she found after entering her daughter’s home after that big fight between Britney and Sam just before her hospitalization:

Two or three paparazzi came into the house and entered the kitchen. They greeted Sam. The paparazzi then reported to Sam where Britney currently was. From the conversation between Sam and the paparazzi I determined that Sam had given Felipe (another paparazzi) one of Britney’s cars to get her out of the house when he heard that Jamie and I were on our way to see Britney. I also understood from the conversation that Sam disabled all of Britney’s cars. (she has several at her residence.)

Sam had told Britney that Jamie and I were coming to the house to do an intervention, and that Britney panicked and took off with Felipe. Another man named Chad Hardcastle was in the house.

I also heard that evening that Britney’s and Sam’s fight that evening, Sam had told Britney that she was an unfit mother, a piece of trash and a whore, that she cares more about Adnan, her current boyfriend, than she cares about her kids, and that she does not deserve her kids.

The paparazzi reported to Sam and addressed him with great respect. They treated him like a general. He instructed them to get her back to the house. They later told Sam that Britney was on her way back.

Britney then came back to the house with Adnan, who is also a paparazzi. Sam then told Jackie [Lynne’s friend] that we needed to do whatever he tells us. I objected. He then told me, “I’m the one who spends 24/7 with your daughter. I sleep in cars outside her house so she can’t leave.” Sam then said, “You people throw everyone under the bus, if you don’t listen to me I’m going to make your name sh** in the papers.”

As I looked around the kitchen, I noticed that in the middle of the kitchen table there was a large car battery. At some point during the evening I learned that the car battery was there so Sam could charge his cell phone. Although Britney has several cell phones, he told us that he had disposed of all of the phone chargers and had made the house phones unworkable.

[From Us Weekly]

You’d think that would be bad enough, but it gets worse. Sam bragged about drugging Britney without her knowledge, and told Lynne that he is in completely control of her and that she better watch out:

Sam told Jackie and me that he grinds up Britney’s pills, which were on the counter and included Risperdol and Seroquel. He told us that he puts them in her food that that was the reason she had been quiet for the last three days (she had been sleeping.) He told us that the doctor who is treating her now is trying to get her into a sleep-induced coma so that they could then give her drugs to heal her brain…

Sam told me,” You’d better learn that I control everything. I control Howard Grossman, Britney’s business manger. I control her attorney’s and the security guards at the gate. They don’t listen to Britney, they listen to me. That’s why Jamie was gone tonight.”

This certainly explains why the Spears’ are fighting so hard to disentangle their daughter from this maniac, and why they didn’t want Howard Grossman to serve as a conservator.

Possibly the most chilling part of Lynne Spears’ testimony is the following, in which Britney asks Sam about getting her sons back:

Britney then said again at some point during the night, “When do I get to see my babies?” Sam answered, “Wednesday. “ Britney then said, “What do I have to do to see them?” Sam responded, “Take the pills I tell you to take.” Britney said, “I don’t like the pills and I don’t like the psychiatrist. Can’t I see another psychiatrist so I can see my babies?” Sam responded, “If I told you to take 10 pills a day, you should do what I tell you to see your babies.” Jackie then said, “Britney, your parents can help you find a psychiatrist. The psychiatrist needs to get to know you to give you the right medicine.” Sam then raised his voice and said, “Why don’t you get back with Kevin.”

This is disturbing for several reasons, but it sounds as though Lutfi has been telling Britney that she will actually be able to see her children, when in fact she has lost all visitation rights. He tells her that she will see the boys on Wednesday, when in reality, there was a custody hearing set for Wednesday. Could it be that Britney shows up at the courthouse thinking she is going to see the children?

As for Sam’s claim that Britney “has hatred” for her father, Lynne testified that it was Britney herself who wanted her father to step in and help.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Sam Lutfi winds up facing criminal charges on this. Maybe some of our esteemed readers who are lawyers can comment on this.

Meanwhile, x17 (which many suspect keeps Lutfi on their payroll) has little to say on this revelation, choosing instead to focus on Britney’s life in lockdown. They actually seem to be siding with Lutfi.

Lutfi told US Weekly that the restraining order against him “won’t last” and that “They’re never gonna be able to rule her forever.”

So Britney somehow hired a new lawyer to represent her in court to challenge the ruling that her father be made conservator of her estate. The judge ruled against Britney’s side, saying that her father, Jamie, can remain in control of her finances and all medical decisions regarding his daughter until February 14th.

Britney’s lawyer, Adam Streisand, who is said to be Barbara Streisand’s second cousin, requested that Northern Trust bank and Howard Grossman, who is Britney’s business manager, be appointed instead as Britney’s conservators. He argued that having her father run her estate is unnecessarily frustrating for Britney. His request was denied and the judge said that Britney wasn’t even mentally competent enough to have hired Streisand to represent her. She will presumably be represented by a lawyer appointed by the court. That court-appointed lawyer visited her in the hospital on Sunday and told the judge that she’s not capable enough to understand the legal case or to have hired her own lawyer. A physician will examine Britney to determine her level of competence and report to the court on February 13.

The lawyers for Britney’s father, Jamie, wanted to have Britney’s legal team of Trope and Trope, who are said to be aligned with Sam Lutfi, fired. That request was not granted and Britney can retain their services. It’s not clear why they did not represent her in this specific case and how she obtained a different lawyer.

The judge addressed the restraining order against Lutfi, saying that the order is that Britney have absolutely no contact with him, including phone calls or e-mail. She is rumored to have been talking to him on the phone. When the conservators of Britney’s estate tried to serve the restraining order personally to Lutfi yesterday, he refused to open the door.

There was also yet another custody hearing for Britney and K-Fed on Monday. It was said to have been scheduled before she was hospitalized for this second time. The verdict is that there will be no changes for now and that she cannot see either of her boys. Britney’s legal reps in the custody battle wanted to request that they be taken off the case, but have withdrawn that request given their clients extreme recent problems.

Meanwhile Britney’s paparazzi boyfriend, Adnan Ghalib, attempted to visit her in the hospital bearing roses. He was seen looking upset while leaving about 20 minutes later, and OK! Magazine reports that it is unknown if he was actually able to see her.

Details from People, AP, TMZ, and OK! Magazine.

Header image from 1/22/08 from Splash News.

Britney’s father Jamie has been granted temporary conservator of her estate and medical affairs by judicial order yesterday. This means that he has control over Britney’s finances, and all medical decisions regarding his daughter. A lawyer has been appointed by the court to help oversee Britney’s estate and ensure that her father handles it well.

Britney’s friend and maybe manager, Sam Lutfi, has been shut out of her life by her family, who obtained a restraining order for 22 days of the “Civil Harassment” type, according to OK! Magazine. The court has ordered that she is a “flight risk” and “at risk for kidnapping” and that she must stay in California until the next court date of February 4. Jamie Spears could possibly be made the “permanent conservator over his daughter’s affairs” at that hearing.

This was said to have really pissed off Britney, and somehow TMZ has privileged information from inside her hospital room. She was supposedly overheard yelling loudly in a British accent and expressing her anger at the situation, saying “Nobody’s taking my house. Who is my family?”

How this information got out is questionable, and given the amount that Lutfi has been talking to the press I wouldn’t put it past him to leak this. She also supposedly said that she would go to court to fight the order, and OK! says “sources close to Lutfi confirm” that Britney has only authorized visits to her hospital room from her cousin, Alli, and Sam. Sam is not allowed anywhere near Britney at this point due to the restraining order. There are guards posted outside her room and security is high at the hospital.

On Monday there could be a hearing requested by Britney’s divorce attorneys, who are aligned with Lutfi, challenging the court-granted control of her estate to her father. But her father, as conservator, could easily fire the firm that sides with Lutfi.

Meanwhile Lutfi is still talking to the press, telling US Magazine all about his feud with Britney’s family and continuing to disclose details of her medical condition. He called Britney’s family crazy and didn’t hesitate to talk trash about them, calling them “hillbillies” and making it sound like he’s Britney’s savoir:

“Oh boy, her family is crazy!” Lutfi told Usmagazine.com in a telephone interview Thursday, the same day the singer was taken to UCLA Medical Center. On Friday, Spears’ parents hit L.A. Superior Court to seek to control their daughter’s medical treatments.

“It’s funny because that’s what the doctors say when they meet the family,” he added. “They always come back and say, ‘You know, [her problems] are inherited, right?’

“It’s just so sad. It’s shared equally from both of her parents.”

He told Us the singer doesn’t “trust anything that her family says? Not a g—-n thing.”

He said they have tried to stage multiple interventions and that Thursday’s move was “at least their fourth” attempt.

When the singer heard Lynne had arrived Sunday night, Lutfi said Britney asked him, ‘Is my mom really here?’ I said, ‘Yeah, she’s here.’ And she’s like, ‘Oh great, you know they’re up to something.’

“They show up to the house like hillbillies, texting me,” Lutfi continued. “I find out that they’re outside, and they go, ‘You better let me in the gate, you ass.’ So I go, to Britney, ‘Your parents are here, let them come in and yell at you and scream at you. If anything else goes on, I’ll throw you in my car and take you out of here.’ She said, ‘OK, fine, baby.’

“I let them in. Instead of going to see how Britney is, they come bouncing through the doors. They scream at me, ‘Why the f—k are you talking to Barbara Walters?’ I swear to God that’s all they were saying.

“The dad pushed me in the chest and said, ‘Get the f—k out of here.’

“The dad gave up and then the mom tried to talk to her, but Lynne was like, ‘I gotta get my beauty sleep, I gotta get my nails done, I gotta do my hair.’ It was just so sick. We made the mom stay.”

Lutfi said the singer suffers from “mixed state bipolar” and has had it for “roughly five years.” (A person suffering from “mixed state bipolar” experiences symptoms of mania and depression at the same time.)

[From US Magazine]

Yesterday JayBird wrote an article giving Lutfi more credit than I think he deserves. She said that Lutfi is the one who managed to get her medical treatment, and to me he seems all too willing to tell everyone about it. This guy has a history of controlling behavior, and has had up to three restraining orders against him by other “friends,” one of whom described how he turned on him and made threats against his family. He also sent threatening text messages to Britney’s new boyfriend warning him to stay out of her life.

Now Britney’s father is in control of her estate and you can’t blame her for being angry about it if she hasn’t had a great relationship with her family.

She’s been spending money like crazy, though, and she needs someone to take care of her finances for her because she’s wasting everything she makes in a month and purchasing new homes and cars constantly.

There is so much drama in Britney’s life and all this fighting among people who presumably want to help her is not making her recovery any easier. It’s not like you expect Britney’s family and her jealous friend to get along, but maybe if they weren’t so concerned with controlling her and were focused more on how to work together to help her she would have the space and calm she needs to get better. With Britney, though, it’s not like she was about to get help unless someone really convinced or forced her to. There’s sure to be a lot more to this story as these two sides continue to battle it out.

The header image is of Britney visiting Longs Drugstore with her mother Lynne Spears, Sam Lutfi and Chad Hardcastle at 1:30 in the morning on January 29th, thanks to WENN for the photo and JayBird for the description.

Photo from May, 2007 of paparazzi shooting Britney pulled over on the side of a busy road to change Sean Preston’s diaper
The mood is definitely somber this Friday after the untimely death of Heath Ledger last week and the mental health hospitalization of Britney early Wednesday morning. I know I’m feeling guilty about our incessant focus on celebrities’ lives, and there has been more of philosophical debate in the wake of all these stories about whether we should work to give them peace and privacy when they’re facing all-too-human difficulties. Many people say that the trade off for fame and fortune is the freedom and anonymity that most of us take for granted. There is also the argument that celebrities like Britney court the paparazzi and strive for any kind of publicity so they have to suffer the consequences that go along with that. Britney is having a severe mental health crisis, something they used to call a “nervous breakdown” when I was younger, and whether she wants to have her photograph taken or not doesn’t seem relevant now that she’s not making sound decisions. The issue is that she’s going crazy and we’re all watching her and indirectly paying people to help us.

A photographer for Splash News has quit over the media circus that surrounds Britney. He says that it’s dangerous to Britney and to other people and that he’s no longer going to be a part of it:

Nick Stern has resigned from Splash, a Los Angeles-based, British-owned celebrity picture agency, in protest at the “aggressive” tactics employed in pursuing Spears, and predicted tragedy.

“Directly or indirectly, Britney is going to come to some horrific end, or a member of the public will,” he said. “It’s not what’s being done, it’s the way it’s being done. As she continues to deteriorate psychologically, I just can’t see a positive way out.”

The biggest threat, Stern said, came from the high-speed convoy of photographers’ cars and motorcycles that follow Spears’ every move through Los Angeles. The pursuit reached a new frenzy in the early hours of yesterday when the paparazzi tailed an ambulance and police escort taking the 26-year-old singer to hospital for the second time this month.

According to the Los Angeles Times, the trail of emergency vehicles that took Spears to the UCLA Medical Centre stretched longer than a football field. In an operation conducted with military precision, police and medical crews spoke secretively of “delivering the package”, in a failed attempt to throw photographers off the scent.

“The paps are completely out of control,” said Stern, 43. “It’s not unusual to have 20 or 30 cars pursuing her at any one time. It’s become acceptable to drive at 80mph down the wrong side of the street into oncoming traffic. I was horrified at what goes on. It’s so aggressive, there are fights and crashes and slashed tyres. I felt I needed to say something.”

[From The Guardian via We Smirch]

Before Britney had her first hospitalization, Perez Hilton answered a question on The View over whether he felt guilty for tearing celebrities down by saying “If Britney committed suicide tomorrow and died, she would be the only one to blame I think.” He wasn’t even asked about Britney and it’s like he was salivating over her possible death. Maybe he was nervous and had some answers prepared ahead of time and it didn’t come out like he wanted it to, but to me he was saying he refused to take any responsibility for the way he was tearing her down.

We talk a lot of smack here too, and I ripped on Heath Ledger about a year and half ago for what I perceived as an inability to play nice with the paparazzi. About a month later, I tried to cover the other side of the story and said I may have misjudged the situation, but maybe the damage was done already. I’m not saying Heath or anyone close to him would bother reading our crap, but maybe the rude way we covered it influenced other people to think he was a whiner too when that wasn’t the case. I often said he was fug and ugly, and that was mean. His death looks like an accident, but if you look at how a few celebrities are affected by the bullshit you can sling without thinking you can feel incredibly guilty.

Now Britney has really lost it, and good for someone to refuse to be a part of that circus. This is dominating the news, there’s almost nothing else going on today, and I feel like we can’t just ignore it. People want to talk about it, and we’ll do our best to cover it tactfully. Please be considerate in the comments and don’t just yell at us to ignore it. I’m thinking about it, and thoughtful comments will be more effective.

One more thing - DListed had this video of Britney getting scared while she was driving earlier this week. She gets out of her car in traffic and talks to the paparazzi in her British accent, asking to turn around. It’s amazing how many photographers swarm around her constantly, but what really struck me, and I mentioned this yesterday, is how many of them are British. It’s like she completely identifies with them and is trying to fit in by speaking in their accent. She’s even dating one of them.

It looks like the long, painful, over-saturated saga of Britney Spears might finally be coming to a head. It’s been about as entertaining as watching someone pull the wings off a fly. But, now that Britney has been held longer than 20 hours on 5150 lockdown, reputable healthcare professionals are finally able to assess her condition. It’s worse than we all suspected:

Sources at UCLA Medical Center tell TMZ Britney Spears has been classified as “G.D.” - Greatly Disabled. That is a huge and dangerous deal. That means the patient is unable to take care of basic needs, such as the acquisition of food, clothing or shelter. Being G.D. is one of the criteria for involuntary commitment.

Several health care professionals tell us Britney has fallen into a “manic state” due to her bipolar disorder. We’re also told, she arrived at the hospital this morning at around 2:15 AM but wasn’t admitted until 4:15 AM, because she was causing such a scene in the hospital.

We first reported that Britney accused her mother of sleeping with her boyfriend. Now we have more. We’re told Britney screamed, “the only reason she’s admitting me is because she wants to be alone with her boyfriend! She wants to sleep with my boyfriend!!” Britney never said exactly who she was talking about.

When Brit calmed down, she talked about her kids, how much she misses them and how it’s unfair that she doesn’t have them.

[From TMZ]

Earlier, it was revealed that Britney’s drug of choice is Adderall, the prescription medication used to treat ADD, and she has been using laxatives.

Lynne Spears, who has been estranged from her eldest daughter for most of the past year, said she was “devastated” by how badly Britney’s condition had deteriorated. Hopefully, the severity of Britney’s condition will give Lynne the strength to do the right thing and get Britney some help. Unless she commits her, Britney could voluntarily leave the hospital– and this time, she might not survive.

Days before Britney Spears’ “carefully orchestrated intervention,” her mother Lynne Spears “flew out” to L.A. Sunday and was shocked to see how badly the singer’s mental condition had deteriorated, a source close to the singer tells Usmagazine.com.

“Lynne was devastated,” a source tells Us. “She hadn’t seen her in a while and to see her deteriorated to this level – what mother wouldn’t be affected by that? It’s awful.”

Over the weekend, pal Sam Lutfi phoned The View’s Barbara Walters, saying that the the singer and her estranged mom were back on speaking terms.

Though the two appeared terse at a Beverly Hills Mercedes-Benz dealership Tuesday morning, Walters quoted Lutfi as saying, “her mother has been very supportive of whatever it is that Britney is trying to do.”

Last night the singer was taken to UCLA Medical Center in a “carefully orchestrated intervention,” the source says. (Lynne arrived with Spears’ latest beau, paparazzo Adnan Ghalib.)

The singer “had been up since Saturday without any sleep,” the source tells Us.

[From Us Weekly]

I truly hope that this is the end of the crazy and the beginning of the healing process for Britney. I’ve said some pretty harsh things about her on this very blog, but right now, I feel really sorry for her. I still believe that a lot of her problems were self-inflicted; and whether she is bipolar or not remains to be seen. She could also be a prescription drug abuser, and she is still a very spoiled young woman who has been out of touch with reality for quite some time. But she is a person– and she is going through hell right now. In front of the whole world.

There are also rumors that her family will be taking Britney back home to Louisiana to finish her recovery. That may be the best thing for her right now. It would be great if we didn’t have to report on the next crazy Britney episode here, and it would be even better if Sean Preston and Jayden James had a healthy, supportive mother in their lives.

Pictures are older ones of Britney, which means last week.

Like many parents, I like to joke that I want to book myself into a psychiatric hospital and get a break from my kids – and it seems that I’m not alone. Grey’s Anatomy star and father of five Justin Chambers (he plays Alex, for those of you who don’t watch it) has booked himself into UCLA psych ward this week for treatment of a sleep disorder.

Chambers, who plays Dr. Alex Karev on the ABC drama, checked into the facility on Tuesday, before promptly checking himself out the following day.

Chambers, 37, who is married with five children aged under 10, went in voluntarily, according to his publicist.

“[He is] exhausted and suffers from a sleeping disorder,” the rep said.

Celebrity Truth

Justin was only in for a short, unspecified amount of time earlier in the week, and missed the drama that must have been last nights admission (oh, you all know who I’m talking about!)

If reports in the New Zealand Herald are to be believed, than it was not necessarily the best place to get some sleep. They say that the hospital has all patients on 24 hour supervision, and that patients can be “quite agitated and screams being heard all hours of the night.”

That seems like a pretty scary place to be. The only psych ward I have ever visited was quiet and pleasant, with patients playing ping pong and watching the Today show. Although I think that people who need to be restrained are usually in a medical ward until they are calm in some hospital systems. Possibly it depends on where a bed is available.

I hope Justin had some good rest, and is ready to tackle the demands of a large family again.

Picture note by Celebitchy: Justin Chambers is shown at the Enchanted World Premiere on 11/17/07, thanks to PRPhotos.

Britney and Adnan at lunch earlier yesterday
According to the many, many articles about this available today, Britney’s family and her new psychiatrist have put her on a psychiatric hold for 72 hours at UCLA medical center. She was admitted to the hospital at 1:30 am this morning. This was done after she was witnessed driving erratically around her neighborhood, having stayed up for over a day and refusing to take her medication.

Britney has reportedly been undergoing treatment for bipolar disorder. There were rumors yesterday that she attempted suicide, but TMZ and The LA Times report that those rumors are false and that “it was apparent that the operation had been carefully planned over a period of time.”

The route to the hospital was blocked off to all paparazzi vehicles and The LA Times says that “The line of emergency vehicles stretched longer than a football field.”

Britney’s mother, her friend Sam Lufti, her psychiatrist, her boyfriend Adnan Ghalib and her assistant/faux cousin Alli Sims were all at the house when she was escorted away.

TMZ has more details of the incident, and says that Britney wasn’t resistant to the intervention, which was planned ahead of time and managed to shield Britney from photographers at a vulnerable time:

TMZ has learned the plan to get Britney into UCLA Medical Center had been hatched for days — it was aborted last night, but executed just minutes ago. And we’re told the plan was so intricate the FAA had cleared airspace in route to the hospital.

Back at her house, Britney’s psychiatrist told her she was going to the hospital. Her response was, “Is something wrong?” She was not resistant. She made hot chocolate and waited before paramedics arrived and placed her on a gurney.

We’re told the psychiatrist felt her condition had deteriorated. Britney had not slept since Saturday — a day and half longer than she stayed up in recent memory.

The reason she’s at UCLA is her new treating psychiatrist practices out of that medical center.

We’re told during her initial 72-hour stay she cannot be forced to take medication against her will. If, however, she refuses to take meds, the plan is for the the psych to go to court and have Britney held for an additional 14 days, during which time he can administer proper medications.

And get this ironic twist — Lynne Spears and Adnan drove to the Medical Center in the same car. A source tells us when Lynne found out Britney was being committed, she blamed it on Sam and was extremely agitated. When Brit heard that, she screamed to her mother, “Shut the hell up.”

[From TMZ]

Britney’s last hospitalization was on January 3 following a standoff with police when she refused to handover her youngest son for a scheduled visit with his father. She has since lost all visitation rights with her two boys and is only permitted to speak to them over the phone.

Britney is clearly affected by the crush of paparazzi who document her every move when she leaves the house. She has been behaving oddly and speaking in a British accent, and if you watch the videos of her interacting with photographers a lot of them are British, including her boyfriend Adnan Ghalib. There have been theories that she suffers from a type of “Stockholm Syndrome,” which is a psychological disorder that occurs when kidnap victims start to identify with their captors.

When you watch the videos of the paparazzi who surround Britney, you can see how it might be an environment that would make someone lose touch with reality. I’m not placing any blame here, she courts the press too and she’s clearly unstable, but this is a very disturbed person who has been exhibiting out of control behavior for a while. It seems she would have a much better chance at recovery if she could start over in another country or a more remote location where she can get some peace and quiet. A hospital in California where her every move will be leaked to the press is a start, but it doesn’t seem like enough for her at this point.