How come Britney hasn't been admitted to a mental ward yet, if she has been bipolar for so long?
—Carrie, London, Ontario
The B!tch Replies: Okay, let's assume Britney has been suffering from a mental illness for some time, as my colleague, Planet Gossip's Marc Malkin, recently was first to report.
So, you ask, why can't we grab her by her rattan weave and drag her into a mental-care facility against her will, Girl Interrupted style?
The answer, it seems, is Britney's boon as well as her curse: fame.
According to top L.A. psychiatrist Mark Goulston, it is legal to have someone involuntarily committed to a facility for up to 72 hours—but only if the patient is thought to be a danger to herself or others. (Killer moves on the dance floor do not count, otherwise Chris Brown would be in lockdown, baby, lockdown! Where was I?)
But proving that someone is a danger like that? Not always easy. In the case of nonfamous civilians, loved ones will often exaggerate the symptoms a bit to get a very sick patient into a facility, Goulston says.
But Britney lives in a fishbowl. If anyone tried to stretch the truth about her activities, her yes-people could just dial up YouTube or X17 and show everybody what actually happened.
As in, she did not say, "I want to kill mahself and mah bebehs" but rather, "I'm a kill mahself without a mocha frap right now, y'all."
Another complication: Britney has money and lawyers.
"She could just say, 'This is just about my mom trying to get me into care, and if you try to get me in, I will have my lawyers speak to you,' " says Goulston, who is also a resident expert on peoplejam.com, a self-help community.
No one wants to get sued by someone with a seemingly unlimited budget for mocha fraps and paid entourages.
And of course, you can't force a free being to take any kind of meds.
So what on Earth might whip Britney back into a happier reality? The answer, Goulston suspects, is both sad and…sadder.
"She needs to be somewhere where she cannot sign in and out," Goulston says. "So, I think she needs to break the law—not to the point where she hurts someone but enough that she gets locked up [involuntarily in a psychiatric ward or mental hospital], and then she'll get the help she needs."- NEXT QUESTION: Did Britney really flee the hospital in a secret tunnel?
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