Heather Mills has admitted that she felt suicidal after 18 months of “abusive articles” about her in the media, which led to death threats for her and her daughter, Beatrice.

She told GMTV this morning that she has been subject to “18 months of abuse, 4,400 abusive articles” since separating from husband Paul McCartney in June 2006: “[The press] make up such lies. They’ve called me a whore, a golddigger, a fantasist, a liar, the most unbelievably hurtful things, and I’ve stayed quiet for my daughter.”

“I’ve had worse press than a paedophile or a murderer and I’ve done nothing but charity for 20 years.”

After receiving “serious death threats from an underground movement”, Heather said “I considered killing myself because I thought if I am dead, [my daughter] can be safe with her father.”

She added that while she couldn’t go into the detail of the ongoing financial discussions, she had been “offered nothing”: “These figures are made up, £100 million, £50 million, £20 million. How do you know if I even want any money? I’m £1.5 million in debt in lawyers’ fees, and that’s as much as I can say or I go to jail, for telling the truth.”

“So I’m gagged at the moment because I’m not allowed to say a word while the media are fed this spin by a certain corner.”

But she denied that she was interested in selling her story after the divorce is finalised: “I could sell my story right now [but] I’m trying to protect Paul and our daughter. I am trying, and I’m being pushed to the edge.”
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• Glamour model Jordan has decided what she would like written on her gravestone when she dies. Jordan, real name Katie Price, revealed recently: “I’d like to have, ‘She had perfect tits’ or ‘Wonder Woman’. I’d like that after all I’ve been through - having kids, trying to make everyone else happy and working hard.” Her husband Peter Andre added that he’d prefer something a little more conventional: “Happy, loving Pete”.
• Denise Richards and Charlie Sheen have reportedly reached a compromise in their ongoing bitter custody dispute after six hour mediation session last week. According to Life & Style, Charlie will continue having monitored visits with daughters Sam and Lola, and has agreed that Denise can take the three year old and two year old to therapy sessions. An inside source told the magazine: “This was a big victory for Denise… She said all she wanted was what’s best for the girls. And Charlie was pleased about settling things.”

While critics have responded positively to Britney Spears‘ comeback album ‘Blackout’, her record label Jive Records is reportedly finding it near impossible to promote the CD because the star is so unreliable at the moment.

An inside source told the New York Daily News: “They can’t get Britney to do anything! They did get her to do one photo-shoot for some promotional materials, but beyond that, they can’t trust her to even show up.”

“This album could’ve been so much bigger with Britney involved. This is the one opportunity they have to try and sell a million records. They were forced to [go on with] their marketing plan [without her].”

“They don’t feel they need her if she’s going to keep blowing them off. She’s already on the cover of every gossip magazine, and she’s on Perez Hilton nearly all day, every day for her antics.”

“Jive is just hoping to continue riding the Britney wave. The label can’t afford to waste their money hoping to get some of her time to help promote this. She’s too busy [hanging out] in a club somewhere.”

According to Entertainment Tonight, Britney was supposed to make an appearance at the Virgin Megastore in Hollywood for the midnight release of the album on Monday but drove away at the last minute when she couldn’t find a parking space near the store. She was later spotted partying at Winston’s with her close friend Sam Lufti.

An onlooker reports: “She kept downing [clear drinks] and danced sloppily all over the place with her sunglasses on.”

• Gasp! Angelina Jolie without her kids (except the possible one in her womb) and not in Changeling costume?! The rather svelte star posed for pictures at the 18th Annual Courage in Journalism Awards held at the Beverly Hills Hotel last night.
• Is Britney Spears looking for another new home? She was snapped looking at properties in the Hermosa Beach area on Monday then stopped for pizza and Coca Cola (not her former employer, Pepsi) afterwards. Later that evening, she went clubbing with her cousin, Alli Sims.
• Also digging the pizza, George Clooney was snapped enjoying a slice of pie on the set of his new film Burn After Reading in Washington yesterday.
• While in London, Sienna Miller continued to film Hippie Hippie Shake around Portobello Road yesterday - after being snapped out and about with boyfriend Rhys Ifans on Monday afternoon.

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Like Christina Aguilera, Jennifer Lopez is refusing to confirm the endless rumours about her current pregnancy but can’t stop the people around her spreading the news instead: fashion designer Roberto Cavalli is the latest to confirm that the star is expecting her first child with husband Marc Anthony.

As well as busily working on costumes for the Spice Girls comeback, Cavalli designed the stage outfits for Jennifer’s current US tour with Marc - and he has now told People magazine that the assignment was a unique challenge: “Well Jennifer Lopez, at this moment, she requests something very special because she is waiting for the baby.”

“The thing about Jennifer Lopez, she is a singer, she is a dancer. Most of the time when I prepare something for the tour, the performer, they want something very soft so they can dance and so they can move free.”

“[But this is even more] so complicated because every week she is getting bigger.”

Jennifer’s baby is thought to be due early in the new year.

This comment by Eloise really made me smile — as I say in my reply, we don’t think it’s necessary to label the difference between adopted children and biological children at every single opportunity.

After writing that reply, I thought it would be worth writing a blog about this sort of thing. Actually, that’s a lie: after writing that comment, I went to bed because it was late but when I woke up this morning, I thought I should write this blog about it ;)

Anyway, yes, we make an effort not to call kids “X’s adopted son” or whatever whenever we refer to them. The parent/s have a much wanted child and the child has a loving parent or parents - it doesn’t matter how that all came about. We tend to do the same with step-children and half-siblings too - unless the people in question stress the step/half nature of the relationship. They are “so-and-so’s daughter” or “$random_star’s brother”.

This is part of our generally bigger effort to not pad out stories with useless tidbits of information when it’s just not appropriate: unlike many other outlets, we didn’t mention the Kate Hudson/Dax Shepard kissing pictures in the whole Owen Wilson suicide coverage (and I blogged about why); we try not to include random notes about people’s personal lives in an article about their new film; and similarly, we won’t label people by their sexuality (or religious people by their religion; or vegetarians/vegans by their non-meat stance; or substance abuser by their addictions…) at every opportunity unless it’s explicitly relevant to the story at hand.

When things *are* relevant, we provide links (usually to our old stories) wherever possible but everything else just smacks as filler and/or unwarranted labelling to define the person as “other”, compared to the mythical constructed concept of what is “normal” - which is both completely unnecessary and damaging in our opinion.