Britt Jones
Warning: This article contains discussion of eating disorders which some readers may find distressing.
Allison Mack has claimed she was put on a strict diet during her time in the 'sex cult' NXIVM.
Mack, who is best known for her role as Chloe Sullivan in the Smallville series, joined the group after allegedly being introduced by one of her co-stars, which presented itself as a self-help support network, but it was soon revealed to be a dangerous pyramid scheme.
The cult was led by Keith Raniere, who was sentenced to 120 years in prison after being convicted on seven charges, including sex trafficking.
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Mack, along with other senior members, would recruit women into the group, where they were branded and forced to have sex with Raniere. In 2021, the 43-year-old pleaded guilty to the charges of racketeering and racketeering conspiracy, and she was sentenced to three years in jail.
In 2023, she was released from prison after serving just 21 months of her sentence.
Since her release, Mack, who has since pursued a new career, has opened up about her experience in a seven-part podcast series with CBC, titled Allison After NXIVM.
In the series, she said that she 'capitalized on the things that I had', including her celebrity status, which she said was 'a power tool that I had to get people to do what I wanted'.
Mack also spoke about how she was put on a ‘pretty extreme’ routine as a member of NXVIM, which included her having to stay between 105 and 107 pounds.
She claimed she had ‘one-minute’ cold showers every morning before she weighed herself so she could get ‘an accurate read'.
“I would write down everything I was going to do and at what time I was going to do it and then how it related to a character trait that I was trying to build in myself,” she said, telling her listeners that Raniere had to sign off on her daily schedule.
“Every single thing that I did was related to some purpose of my character building.”
Podcast host and journalist Natalie Robehmed said that the actress was ‘significantly underweight’ when she was in the cult.
“To achieve this absurd goal weight, Keith put her on a 500 calorie a day diet, less than a third of what’s recommended for an adult woman, basically a starvation regimen,” Robehmed said.
Mack further claimed she was not allowed to eat after 5 pm, turned orange because of her squash-heavy diet and chewed ‘so much gum’ it made her mouth ‘raw’.
“I was running 6 miles a day. I was really into half marathons, so I was running at least 6 miles on 500 calories,” she said. “I was very into yoga, so I was doing yoga. I did yoga every morning for about six years.”
For breakfast, she would eat ‘kabocha squash, plain nonfat Greek yogurt, a little bit of honey, a little bit of almond butter, and maybe some blueberries,’ a salad for lunch and then ‘glass noodles with kale, jalapeno peppers, and more kabocha squash,’ Robehmed said.
Then, on Mondays, she would fast from 5pm on Sunday until 5am on Tuesday.
She said: “I always had these huge scarves, because I was always, always cold. I was so thin that I could touch my fingers together around my waist. I mean, I was anorexic.”
If you have been affected by any of the issues in this article and wish to speak to someone, contact National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders (ANAD). You can reach them on their free hotline at 1(888)-375-7767, which is open Monday-Friday, 9am-9pm CST.