Dear Britney,

My heart goes out to you for the terrible time you've been having. As if it weren't bad enough not knowing your up from your down, you're stalked 24/7 by the paparazzi salivating to get a shot of you in just such an upside-down moment. It's gotten so bad that it seems from the outside that you don't even know that you have the right to some privacy, what with you shacking up with a notorious heart-breaking paparazzo who, by the way, has publicly referred to you as his "meal ticket."

What I'm trying to say is, you need a time out. No more low-speed chases and running red lights and crashing into other peoples' expensive vehicles. I know that staying indoors is excruciatingly boring, especially when you are so used to having an entourage and 100 noisy, clamoring photogs pushing you in every direction. Even so, you definitely need some down time.

Being that this is next to impossible for you to accomplish right this moment, I have some good suggetions on taking the heat off--you may not like them, but here goes... If there's one thing the paps have NO interest in, it's a fat girl. Put down the exercise videos and lay off your trainer. No one fades into Hollywood obscurity faster than an overweight woman. I'm not suggesting you sacrifice your health, just relax your standards a little. If you're REALLY feeling inspired, put out a truly terrible "experimental" album. If you don't know what I mean, give Diamanda Galas a call, she's probably listed (not to be confused with Diamante and Galant which are made by Mitzubishi, which you also may not have heard of).

Like magic you will be much less photogenic, your head will bring a lower price and there will be fewer paps. Of course the die-hards that want to watch you completely flip out will still be hanging around, so what you can do to lose them would be to be a super-boring, normal-26-year-old-mom-of-two type. Wear underwear, lose the extensions and the "gentelmen's club" blonde. Ditch the enormous sunglasses (SOoo 2006 anyway, right?) Go to your court hearings for Pete's sake, those babies need their mommy. And finally, obey the traffic laws.... and.... TAH-DAH!! You will have enough physical space to work out whatever is going haywire in your mental space. It may not be intuitive, but sometimes the best course is the change how you act in order to change how you think.