Earlier this month, pop superstar Ke$ha checked herself into a rehab facility to get treatment for her eating disorder. Aside from that, we didn’t get much information on the subject…until now.

During a recent interview with PEOPLE, Ke$ha’s mom Pebe Sebert opened up about her daughter’s extreme weight loss methods, and how they almost killed her.

“I’ve watched my beautiful, self-confident, brilliant daughter be berated and ridiculed for her looks and weight to the point that she almost died,” Sebert says. “The doctors told me her blood pressure and sodium levels were so low, they’d never seen it that low except with someone who’d had a heart attack or stroke. They said it was a miracle she hadn’t already dropped dead on stage.”

Ke$ha, who is now 26-years-old, has apparently been battling her body issues since she was in middle school, but Sebert said they got increasingly worse when she signed with producer Dr. Luke and her former manager David Sonenberg. “One time on a conference call, Sonenberg was screaming, ‘You need to lose weight! I don’t care what you do … take drugs, not eat, stick your finger down your throat!’ ” Sebert recalls. “Ke$ha was just weeping. She drove around afterward thinking about killing herself.”

Sonenberg wasn’t the only one criticizing Ke$ha for her weight. “He [Dr. Luke] has just always been very disrespectful about her weight. He’d say it in certain ways, like ‘Why don’t you try running?’ She was doing everything and not getting thin fast enough, and that’s when she first became bulimic.” Obviously, Sonenberg and Dr. Luke both denied the allegations.

Dr. Luke even had his rep release a statement on his behalf. “These statements and allegations concerning Dr. Luke are completely false,” the statement reads. “It is unfortunate that at a time Ke$ha is suffering immensely and trying to heal at a treatment center, her mother is taking this approach with the media. I give Ke$ha my utmost support and well wishes for a quick return to health.”

Upon entering the rehab facility, Ke$ha released a statement of her own. “I’m a crusader for being yourself and loving yourself but I’ve found it hard to practice,” she wrote. “I’ll be unavailable for the next 30 days, seeking treatment for my eating disorder … to learn to love myself again. Exactly as I am.”

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