Full frontal nude photos posted by Britney Spears to her 41 million Instagram followers yesterday, which have sparked concerns about her mental health among her devoted fans, could be a sign the star is attempting to reclaim control of her lost youth’ following the trauma of conservatorship, according to a top psychologist.
The shocking photos show Spears covering her naked breasts with her hands and hiding her genitals with a heart an emoji. Each photo was similar, taken on vacation in Mexico prior to becoming pregnant, but with different filters.
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‘Photo dump of the last time I was in Mexico BEFORE there was a baby inside me,’ the pregnant singer captioned her first post, which included six naked photos, adding, ‘Why the hell do I look 10 years younger on vacation?’
Three more extremely similar photos appeared minutes later.
Within minutes, fans expressed concern for the singer’s mental health, with one writing, ‘This girl she is sick, she is crying for help,’ and another, ‘I’m pretty sure that conservatorship was put in place for a reason.’
Others wondered why her partner hadn’t warned her about the photo dump. Dr Audrey Tang, author of The Leader’s Guide to Resilience, told FEMAIL that the exhibitionist photos could be a sign that Britney is still trying to break free from her father’s 13-year conservatorship.
Dr Audrey Tang told FEMAIL: ‘The latest photos might seem like a cry for help but I’m not sure Britney is even thinking in that way.
‘She’s still processing the conservatorship and her life since she was a child star – when you’ve been gaslit for that long, you often emerge not knowing who you are.’
Therapy can help get her life back on track though, Dr Tang says, with the help of a technique known as acceptance and commitment therapy.
She explains: ‘It’s about not going over the coercive control again, but understanding why she feels the need to post these photos now. I believe Britney’s still in a form of survival mode, just because the conservatorship has ended, it doesn’t mean that she’s stopped fighting.
‘If she stops fighting for a minute, and sit with her emotions, she’ll recognise that the need to post such images is probably ‘urge-surfing’ to fill a void. Therapy is about trying to choose a different behaviour to answer the gap that’s happening.
‘It’s not easy to get through the multitude of emotions someone might feel after being in a situation like this – it’s similar with divorce – but you can find ways to begin to understand how you chose to survive and how those choices don’t need to keep happening again.’
Within minutes, fans expressed concern for the singer’s mental health, with one writing, ‘This girl she is sick, she is crying for help,’ and another, ‘I’m pretty sure that conservatorship was put in place for a reason.’
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Others wondered why her partner hadn’t warned her about the photo dump. Dr Audrey Tang, author of The Leader’s Guide to Resilience, told FEMAIL that the exhibitionist photos could be a sign that Britney is still trying to break free from her father’s 13-year conservatorship.
Dr. Tang also speculated that the star may be ‘urge-surfing,’ or impulsively seeking attention from fans.
Since the legal battle, which garnered worldwide attention and resulted in Spears regaining control of her finances, medical and personal decisions, the singer has announced an engagement, and pregnancy, and expressed concern that the 13-year-long conservatorship was censoring her.
‘When you have someone who has grown up with a very scripted lifestyle, you have someone who has never learned what freedom is actually like,’ explains Dr Tang.
‘The problem is that she can’t learn to do that now in a safe environment and experiment, so she’s doing it all in public.’ And because it’s Britney, the fallout will be far greater than it would be for anyone else. It’s similar to a mid-life crisis.
Spears recently vented about feeling silenced during the conservatorship period, saying she was ‘paralyzed’ by ’15 years of secrets.’
‘In my conservatory, I was a f*****g nun!!! The silent prayer I’ve endured might offend the Pope.’
In describing how Britney is now fighting back against having much of her childhood and adulthood took away from her, psychologist Dr Tang suggests that the star may be attempting to emulate the attention she received during the peak of her pop career – but in ways that may cause her mental health to suffer.
‘She’s grown in up in the public eye, and she’s adapted her life to need that attention – if you haven’t been able to get it in any other way, that’s the way you do it.
‘A child who knows that they succeed in something will get there parents love and it’s the same sort of thing here. Britney thinks “If I post something that gets me likes, that’s something that will get me attention and likes”‘.
‘On the issue of maturing of decisions and making choices, she’s probably still in her twenties. She hasn’t been able to go through any of that, she’s aged but she’s not grown. You can’t expect someone to just grown up 20 years.
Dr Tang says that even with a crack team of therapists and psychologists around her, Britney may still not be ready to listen to them because she wants to finally be able to make her own mistakes.
