Britney Spears, whose marriage and parenting skills are under a media microscope, tearfully admitted being "an emotional wreck" in excerpts of an interview aired on Thursday.

Intermittently weeping and chewing gum throughout, Spears denied she is estranged from her husband, Kevin Federline, saying on NBC's "Today" show that Federline is helping her weather the hormonal ups and downs of her second pregnancy.

"He helps me. He has to. I'm an emotional wreck right now," Spears said. "Not in a bad way. Just, just, you know, I'll start laughing hysterically and then I'll just start crying, like just because ... . It's my hormones.

She called paparazzi images of her driving with her infant son, Sean Preston, on her lap "cheap shots" and said that as a small child, she sat in her father's lap as he drove.

Spears said she has wept on occasion over allegations that she is a bad mother, and wished only that paparazzi would leave her alone.

"You have to realize that we're people and that we need, we just need privacy and we need our respect," she said. "And those are things that you have to have as a human being."

The remarks were excerpted from an interview to be shown on NBC's "Dateline."