Britney Spears stared at herself in a mirror, grinning as she grabbed an electric clipper.

Chunks of her long, iconic locks fell to the floor of the Southern California salon. Paparazzi cameras outside documented every second of the now-infamous night in 2007, later following her with her new buzzcut to get a tattoo.

The star said she did it because she felt cornered and humiliated by the paparazzi, who had chased her from the house of her estranged husband, Kevin Federline.

In the midst of an acrimonious and widely publicised custody battle for their two young boys, the Princess of Pop said she acted out in defiance and wanted to give the press "some material". She called it an impulsive decision - one that to her, served as a public rebuke to a world she felt held her to untenable standards.

To her, it was a "desperate move by a desperate person".

But to her estranged husband, it was a wake-up call to "just how far things had spiralled out of control".

Decades later, those moments and the others that went on to define the pop star and her very public unravelling are back in the limelight - but what exactly happened and why depends on who is doing the retelling.

After Spears shared her outlook in her 2023 memoir, The Woman In Me, Federline is now speaking out and sharing his take on their years together in a book released this week, titled You Thought You Knew.

Like Spears, Federline's book details their intimate and chaotic relationship, the mental anguish they both suffered and provides an inside glimpse at the conservatorship battle that dictated much of Spears' life and career. It provides a side-by-side look, a he-said, she-said dissection of their lives.

The Grammy Award winner, 43, has already denounced her ex's memoir, writing on social media that Federline's revelations have been "extremely hurtful and exhausting".

But the dancer-turned-reality TV star says he's releasing You Thought You Knew after years of hesitation because he does not want his children growing up "feeling like they have to explain who their father is".

Federline responds to the stories and accusations that Spears tells in her 2023 tome, in which she describes being financially and emotionally controlled by those closest to her. He contradicts her account at times, levying fresh accusations.

Despite both memoirs offering vastly different accounts at times, both have a similar aim in reframing the public narrative thrust upon them by illuminating the episodes that led to Spears' conservatorship battle, as well as the nationwide movement that freed the pop star in 2021.

In her book, Spears condemned the court-ordered conservatorship, also known as a guardianship, which she was under from 2008-2021. During that........

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