Britney wrote 'suicide note'

OUT-of-control singer Britney Spears has written a suicide note detailing how things would be better if she was dead, it has emerged. A friend of the 26-year-old found the note before her infamous Beverly Hills meltdown this month. It reportedly told of Spears' loneliness and fear of not living up to the expectations of fans and family. The star has been suffering with mental problems including depression and possible multiple personality disorder "for years" - but docs say she needs urgent help as her condition seems to be worsening. Another bizarre incident came to light overnight when Britain's The Sun newspaper revealed Spears emerged from a clothes shop changing room nude after spending 45 minutes inside with her British photographer lover Adnan Ghalib. An assistant said they made “weird” noises like they were having sex - and Spears swore at staff when she left. “She was slurring and spitting," one worker told the paper. "Her face was covered with cold sores and acne, and her scalp was patchy.” It has also been reported that Spears lost the right to see her sons after missing a vital court date in her child-custody battle because she was too busy waiting for a home furniture delivery. Spears' suicide note was found in her bathroom just before she was rushed to a psychiatric ward after refusing to hand her sons to Federline’s security guards. It was discovered by a friend who thought it “a cry for help”. “The letter was very sad," an insider said. "Britney talked about her loneliness, how unfair life is and not being able to trust people. “She wrote about how she will never be what people want her to be. She said, ‘Perhaps it would be better if I was dead’.” When confronted, The Sun revealed Spears laughed it off and said: “Everybody thinks about death.” Spears' manic depression is also known as bipolar disorder. The source said: “She also has something much more serious she doesn’t want to talk about. “She may have multiple personality disorder. And she had post-natal depression after both births.”

Dr. Phil Criticized for Britney Brouhaha

Dr. Phil McGraw arrives at the Museum of Television and Radio's annual gala in Beverly Hills, Calif., in this Oct. 30, 2006, file photo. McGraw has pulled the plug on plans for a one-hour show that was to examine Britney Spears' latest public meltdown. In a statement posted Monday, Jan. 7, 2008, on his Web site, McGraw said the 26-year-old pop star's situation was "too intense" for him to go forward with the show. He didn't say whether he planned to reschedule. Spears was hospitalized Thursday night after a child custody dispute with ex-husband Kevin Federline resulted in an hours-long standoff with police. On Friday, a court commissioner gave sole physical and legal custody of 1-year-old Jayden James and 2-year-old Sean Preston to Federline. McGraw said he met with Spears for an hour Saturday before she left the hospital. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles, file)

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Dr. Phil's public brand of tough love sometimes makes him tough to love, particularly among mental health professionals who are accusing television's self-help guru of making an uncalled-for house call on Britney Spears this week.
Although Dr. Phil — whose full name is Phillip McGraw — announced Monday that he is shelving plans for a show on Spears' latest breakdown, some in the mental health community say just showing up at her hospital room last week was going too far.
"It's true people sometimes need to be placed under involuntary mental health treatment because they can't take care of themselves," veteran psychiatrist Dr. Jeffrey Sugar said of the 26-year-old Spears. "But there's a difference between being detained involuntarily for psychological treatment and being forced to endure Dr. Phil involuntarily."
Spears, who appeared to have enough trouble already, saw McGraw barge into her life Saturday when he showed up at her room at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center as she was about to be discharged. She had been taken there Thursday after an hours-long standoff with police that was triggered by her custody dispute with ex-husband Kevin Federline.
A court commissioner on Friday gave Federline full custody of sons, 1-year-old Jayden James and 2-year-old Sean Preston.
McGraw said he was invited to the hospital by Spears' family.
Sugar, chief of child and adolescent psychiatry, crisis and emergency service for the University of Southern California, said that isn't good enough. Late adolescent or not, he said, Spears is still an adult who has the right to decide who she lets into her hospital room.
In a statement posted on his Web site Monday, McGraw said he had hoped to film a show this week that might help other families facing the same troubles as Spears.
That's assuming, of course, they have been in and out of rehab in recent months, arrived in public in short skirts and no underwear, shaved their heads bald, run over a photographer's foot, banged up a car in a parking lot and left without notifying the owner, and attacked another car with an umbrella.
But in the end even McGraw, never too shy to blurt "What were you thinking?" to a troubled guest, seemed to agree that putting Spears or her family and friends in front of the cameras wasn't wise.
"Because the Spears situation is too intense at this time, and out of consideration to the family, I have made the decision not to move forward with the taping," he said on his Web site. He didn't say whether he planned to do a show later, and a spokeswoman for the show declined to elaborate.
"Certainly I think it's a good idea to stop that show dead," said Dr. Richard Harding, professor of neuropsychiatry at the University of South Carolina. "This isn't the time to be exploiting anybody and making examples out of anybody."
Sociologist Julie Albright, an expert in family therapy at USC, agreed with Harding that while McGraw's sometimes bellicose approach can be helpful under the right circumstances, Spears is in perhaps too fragile an emotional state for it.
"It looks as though her behavior has been unraveling for some time now. Frankly, it's reached a point of being pretty frightening," she said.
"People may have thought it was entertaining or funny, but really it's a cry for help, and I hope people around her will respond and get her the help she needs," Albright said.
Also, Albright said, the tough-love therapy that McGraw practices is really only the first of many steps therapists must take to change destructive behavior. What's more, she said, it really only works when the recipient is receptive.
"It's hard to do therapy or intervention in a half-hour or one hour-spot," she said. "They have these longer interventions that they follow up with. That's where important change will occur, not necessarily in the one-hour sound bite of a show."
Still, at least one pop psychologist couldn't fault McGraw for trying.
"I'm sure Dr. Phil does not want to exploit her. He has all this experience in helping people get over problems," said Dr. Joyce Brothers, who herself has been dispensing psychological advice to TV viewers for more than 30 years.
But Brothers, who like McGraw has a Ph.D. in psychology, acknowledged that key for any therapist is getting the person to listen to them.
"He has a lot to offer," Brothers said of McGraw. "But only to the person who wants it."