Abby Lee Miller Reveals She Was Abused During Her First Days in Prison

Dance Moms star Abby Lee Miller claims she faced different forms of abuse during her eight months in prison.

During an interview with Access Hollywood Live Monday, the Lifetime star claimed a prison doctor took her off medications and a female prison guard assaulted her.

“I read 150 books and I laid in the sun. I walked around the track, and I was in great shape,” Miller, 53, said. “Then the prison doctor took me off all of my medication cold turkey.”

Miller claimed that on “day one” guards tried to rip off her eyelashes, believing she was wearing strips, when in fact, she wore extensions on individual lashes. She claimed guards were also “ripping earrings out of your ears, all kinds of things.”

She said she did report these abuses, but nothing was done.

“There were other situations that I haven’t talked about publicly, things that went on, and I did finally speaking to our new warden and he was phenomenal. He was excellent. He was well spoken. He was nice to me. He understood the situation,” Miller said. “He had read my case. And he knew what was going on and I think I did finally get out in March because he was there.”

“Life has been much better outside. But I went away for eight months and then I feel like I went away again when you go to Cedars (Sinai Medical Center). It’s pretty much comparable,” she told Access Hollywood.

Miller was indicted on fraud charges in 2015, and sentenced to a year and one day in prison. She spent the last part of her sentence at a California halfway house for cancer treatment.

In 2018, she had spinal surgery, and her doctors discovered she had Burkitt lymphoma, a type of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Late last month, Miller told PEOPLE her cancer is “completely gone.”

In an interview with Us Weekly, Miller said she rarely lashes out since she battled cancer.

“I feel grateful. I feel alive and thriving when I’m back in the [dance] studio and I get in my zone and I’m just doing my thing,” Miller told the magazine. “I don’t think I get that upset over things. It’s hard to deal with the moms, all of that’s hard, but I don’t fly off the handle as quickly as I did…And when the kids don’t win, I’m like, ‘Yeah, but you were great.’”

Miller also has the return of Dance Moms to look forward to. On Tuesday, Lifetime will air Dance Moms: The Return of Abby, an hour-long special following Miller’s cancer battle, at 8 p.m. ET. The first two episodes of Dance Moms: Resurrection will follow at 9 p.m. ET.

For the new season, Miller will be seen using a wheelchair, which she needs after her treatments.

“It’s not difficult in the chair because I always sat there anyways, so that’s not a big deal,” Miller told Us Weekly. “What’s not good is while you’re shooting 12 hours a day, I’m not doing the exercises that I’m supposed to do. I’m missing lots of physical therapy appointments. … I’m not really taking care of myself like I did.”

Photo credit: Jesse Grant/Getty Images for Lifetime