Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake famously dated from 1999 to 2002, and now, in her upcoming memoir, The Woman in Me, the pop star alleges that during their relationship, she became pregnant.
Spears says that after Timberlake learned the news, he convinced her to have an abortion.
โIt was a surprise, but for me, it wasnโt a tragedy,โ Spears wrote in an excerpt shared exclusively with People. โI loved Justin so much. I always expected us to have a family together one day. This would just be much earlier than Iโd anticipated.โ
She continued, โBut Justin definitely wasnโt happy about the pregnancy. He said we werenโt ready to have a baby in our lives, that we were way too young.โ
โIf it had been left up to me alone, I never would have done it. And yet Justin was so sure that he didnโt want to be a father.โ
Spears writes that in the end, she decided to go along with Timberlakeโs wishes.
โIโm sure people will hate me for this, but I agreed not to have the baby. I donโt know if that was the right decision. If it had been left up to me alone, I never would have done it. And yet Justin was so sure that he didnโt want to be a father.โ
The singer confessed, โTo this day, itโs one of the most agonizing things I have ever experienced in my life.โ
Reps for Timberlake did not immediately respond to Fox News Digitalโs request for comment.
Spears and Timberlake met while appearing on the Disney Channelโs The All New Mickey Mouse Club when they were children. Though they were both barely preteens then, Timberlake later told GQ, โI was in love with her from the start. I was infatuated with her from the moment I saw her.โ
After the show ended, they went their separate ways, but they soon found their respective paths to pop superstardom โ and back to each other.
In 1999, the year Spears released โโฆ Baby One More Timeโ while Timberlake was riding high as the heartthrob in the immensely popular boy band NSYNC, the two began dating. They broke up in 2002 when she was 20 and he was 21.
Spears went on to have two children, sons Sean, born in 2005, and Jayden, born in 2006, with ex-husband Kevin Federline.