Britney returned to her hometown this weekend, her first trip back to Kentwood since her aunt’s funeral early last year. So why the sudden burst of nostalgia? Could be the popstar’s attending her sister’s baby shower.

Aaaw, dysfunctional family reunions, aren’t they the greatest?

Britney’s been required to pay almost $400,000 in legal fees — and that’s just for 3 months of service! In fact, Samuel Ingham, Spears’s court-appointed attorney, gets $10,000 a week,
Andrew Wallet, the co-conservator of Spears’s finances, will receive an advance of $100,000. (Wallet had not been paid since becoming involved last February.).

The firm which won Jamie Spears control of his daughter’s affairs will also be advanced $175,000, and a lawyer representing Britney’s brother Bryan Spears will get $22,500, while Stacy Phillips, Britney’s new divorce lawyer, will receive $75,000.

The singer’s father and Wallet remain in control of her life until a July 31 hearing.

Kevin Federline’s lawyer says he’s “happy” that Britney has gotten some of her act together. “Before, it wasn’t a question of what was going to happen, but when,” he says. But he says that reports that she’s fully recovered are premature.

“Jamie is doing a really good job,” he says, refering to her father. “There was a situation and that seems to be stabilized. Does that mean she’s cured? Of course not.”

Britney’s father is putting up several of the pop star’s cars for sale, explaining that the “cost of maintenance” was too high. According to his lawyers, this “will save substantial expense to the conservatorship estate.”

Her collection includes two white Mercedes (a SL65 and a CLK350), a white Mini Cooper convertible, and a black Audi.

We can only wonder if the money will actually go to Britney, or to you-know-who’s pockets.
But, maybe her Dad’s just thinking of a way to help her pay the huge legal bills

Oh, my. Britney Spears — who has about $100 million in assets — is stuck to a measly$1,500-a-week allowance which she has to get via a debit card.

What the hell? Okay, so her property’s under conservatorship, but what would merit cutting off her access to her own cash? (What — so her Dad can spend more of it?)

Well if that’s the case, Kevin’s got to shoulder some of the legal fees, her lawyer argues. After all, who can you hire with $1,500 a month?

K-Fed’s lawyer spills his guts in an exclusive interview with E! He talks about the deal that the pop star made in order to see her kids.

Britney’s supposedly appointed a new lawyer — and he claims that her civil rights have been violated.

Jon Eardley said: “These are issues of confinement. Very serious confinement. Not allowed to contact her friends. Not allowed to use the phone. Not allowed to come and go as you please. Bodyguards controlling you and so forth.”

However, legal experts say that Eardley’s legal grandstanding has no ground. In fact, the Superior Court has found that Spears “lacks the capacity” to choose her own counsel.
That’s one reason her former lawyer has dropped from the case.

Teen idols have to stick together. Miley Cyrus

Pretty generous of Miley to say that. So far she’s stayed out of trouble — she says she hasn’t even gone out on a “real date” yet. But that was the same spiel Britney Spears gave everyone (Ms. “I’m not going to have sex until after I get married”) and look where she is now.

Britney Spears has been very quiet lately, staying away from paparazzi, practicing her routine at the Millenium Dance omplex, and actually teaching dance classes

Here she emerged from a dance lesson she gave to six kids. “It was amazing!” gushes Robert Baker, the complex director. (Wish we could say the same for those fishnet stockings, though.)

Somebody put the brakes on Britney’s parents. Ever since the judge granted them the legal right to control her property (and even her friends) they’ve barred friends from visiting her house, fired her attorney, and is now even kicking out her business manager.

The “Spears Shakedown” has us wondering what her parents’ intentions are. Are they so low to use their daughter’s nervous breakdown as a chance to gain control of her money and career? Maybe this is why she kicked them out of her life years ago.

With a family like that, no wonder she’s depressed.

Britney Spears has been released from the 72 hour hold at UCLA Medical Center’s psych ward — but against the doctors’ advice.

The court representatives found “no just cause” for the hold, even though her medical team and her parents felt she was safer under medical care.

By law, the courts have a hearing at the hospital to find out whether the hold is justified. This procedure is directed by a lawyer, who interviews the patient and the doctor to see if there’s “just cause” for detainment.

“This is when law and medicine collide,” says attorney Terry K. Wasserman, who’s not involved in the Spears matter, “when a lawyer can override a doctor’s opinion.”

Britney Spears’ parents defends their decision to place a restraining order against Sam Lufti, saying that he had verbally abusing her and drugging her.

This was one reason Britney was in such a “chaotic” state when Lynne Spears found her the night they whisked her to the hospital. She was talking like a very young girl. “Britney picked up a bottle of pills and read part of the label and asked us, ‘What does insomnia mean?’ Sam told her the pills will help her stay awake.” She also kept changing her clothes and her dogs’ clothes “many times.”

Lynne says that Lufti had cut off Britney’s phone lines, confiscated her phone charges, and ground up pills and put it in her food. The medicines Risperdal (and anti psychotic drug) and Seroquel (used for bipolar disorder) had been one reason why Britney had been sleeping so much the last week. “[Lufti] told us that the doctor who is treating her now is trying to get her into a sleep-induced coma so that they could give her drugs to heal her brain.”

Lufti claims he’s the only one who cares about Britney. “I’m the one who spends 24/7 with your daughter. I sleep in cars outside her house so she can’t leave.” He told her parents, “If I weren’t in the house to give Britney her medicine, she would kill herself. If you try to get rid of me, she’ll be dead and I’ll piss on her grave.”

Lynne says that Lufti is hardly a friend, and that he often verbally abuses her. “Sam had told Britney that she was an unfit mother, a piece of trash and a whore, that she cares more about [paparazzo] Adnan [Ghalib], her current boyfriend, than she cares about her kids, and that she does not deserve the kids.”

Britney’s doctor has decided to extend her stay to 14 days — a sign that there’s a serious problem. She’s also been placed in a padded cell, usually done if a patient has become violent or can pose a danger to herself or others.

So what’s life like for Brit?  She’s not completely under lock and chain — she can use her own clothes, receive visitors, make calls on the public phones.

But it’s not the life she used to have…and she’s not the Brit we used to know. What a sad, sad turn of affairs for this pop star. Hopefully, the only way to go is up.

Courts have granted Britney Spears’ parents, Jamie and Lynne Spears, temporary control over her finances, visitor access, medical records, and even her property (for example, they can change the locks of her mansion, or raid her growing collection of pink wigs). She is still undergoing psychiatric evaluation.

The first thing the couple did was to issue a restraining order against Sam Lufti, Britney’s friend. He says: “I object to this. Britney is fully capable of handling her own finances. Her doctors are capable of handling her health care. You’d think in a time like this, the family would be at the hospital taking care of their daughter, rather than fighting for her money. How sad.”

Why would Britney check herself in at 1 am? Did something happen? Was there an ‘episode’ or some imminent danger to health that it couldn’t wait till morning? CNN reports that it was an “intervention” staged by her psychiatrist. It could explain why her mom had been visiting her. And why the reunion was particularly tense.

Family sources say everyone is worried, but hopeful that this could finally mean that Britney is willing to get the help she needs. “She’s been manic for years,” they said. “Please, pray.”

Britney Spears was rushed by ambulance to the UCLA Medical Center for a psychiatric hold at 1 am Thursday morning.

She went voluntarily, sensing that she needed help. She hadn’t slept for days and had been driving madly around the streets. She even joked to attendants about how this was her second visit.

Spears’ mother, and friends Alli Sims and Sam Lufti were with her when the police and fire department arrived. A family source said: “Britney has been prescribed medication which she refuses to take. This is just another sad, sad evening.”

Oh my God, is Britney pregnant???

She and her sleazy paparrazo boyfriend were seen shopping for a pregnancy test in their neighborhood Rite Aid store.

On top of a mental breakdown and losing visitation rights, this is the last thing she needs.

Friends have said that she’s going through a lot now, and just needs “time and space” to sort things out. It would help if she used her common sense, too. How is she going to fix her life and career if she keeps doing STUPID THINGS???

And the Britney saga goes on. This week, she’s locked herself up in the bathroom with her kid, checked into a mental institute, and lost custody. While her mom accuses Dr. Phil of betraying their family’s “circle of trust” she and her paparazzo boyfriend Adnan Ghalib escaped to the Bahamas.

Yes, that’s right. First the couple shook off the press by saying that they’d go to New York. Hours later, they turned up in Baja! Rosarito Beach, Mexico — about 3 hours away from her Beverly Hills home. Then, with a sudden burst of intelligence (yes, her brain is still there somewhere) she cancels their romantic rendezvous and goes back home.

Its not easy being parents, especially if the person you’re parenting is Britney Spears.  In what seems like now as a neverending saga of the hellish side of fame, Britney’s folks have now criticized Dr.Phil for his blatant betrayal and exploitation of what they felt was a private problem of their child.

“What’s wrong with Dr. Phil’s statement is that he made a statement,” the Spears reps said, referring to the tv doctor’s  very public diagnosis that Spears was “in dire need of medical and psychological intervention.” ( as if we didn’t know that already)

“The family basically extended an invitation of trust for him to come in as a resource to support them, not to go out and make public statements. Any statements publicly that he made, because he was brought in under this cloak of trust, are just inappropriate. We feel like, to set the record straight, we need to say that.” They said.

The straight shooting Texan doctor said he didn’t regret a thing.

More alarming Britney news! Britney Spears is on “medical hold” at Cedars - Sinai Medical Center. Things finally came to a head when Britney refused to give her children to Kevin Federline’s bodyguards when they came to her house to pick the kids up as part of a court order. She reportedly locked herself in one of the rooms with Jayden James. The fire brigade and the police had to be called to mediate and after a reported three - hour standoff. Paramedics were called in when it was determined that Britney was under the influence of an unknown substance.

Jayden James was safely retrieved from Britney and it was reported that she was brought out of the house and into an ambulance in a stretcher and looking absolutely out of it.

She is now undergoing psychological and physical tests and there are reports that she is also on suicide watch.

Never was a fan of Britney, but I really am worried for her right now. Here’s hoping that 2008 will be a better year for the erstwhile pop princess.