Christina Applegate has revealed that she was misdiagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
During an episode of her podcast, MeSsy, on Tuesday, Applegate said that her doctor says she doesn’t have the autoimmune disease and was misdiagnosed.
“This may come as great news, but to me, I’m back at square one where I don’t know what’s going on with me,” the 54-year-old actor said during the podcast with her co-host, Jamie-Lynn Sigler, who has been public about her own battle with MS.
Applegate first publicly announced in 2021 that she had been diagnosed with MS, which causes the immune system to attack the cells in the central nervous system.
The Married with Children alum said that regardless of the misdiagnosis, she still has “every symptom of someone with MS.”
“You don’t get misdiagnosed and then all of the sudden I’m better. I haven’t gotten better. If anything, I’ve gotten worse in some ways,” she continued.
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Applegate said that her illness has now become a mystery.
“There’s a pretty damn high number of misdiagnoses with MS,” she said, adding, “It’s clear now that they’re finding something different.”
Applegate said the news had put her in an odd place since she and Sigler have become prominent advocates for people with MS.
“It’s weird because I feel like I let everybody down,” she said. “It’s very unnerving, and it’s really confusing for me.”
“It’s this weird feeling because I became this — you and I, the poster children for MS,” she said. “I had a reason. I had a f—-ing reason as to why my day sucked every day. And now I don’t have a reason and it’s very unnerving and it’s really confusing for me.”
In the second part of the podcast episode, Applegate said that she’s feeling “lost” while reflecting on the past five years of her life.
“I’ve gone through a great depression because of it. But, you know, I lost everything. I lost my job,” Applegate said as she broke down in tears.
“God, I’m so sorry, I get really emotional because it stopped my life. I still have to use wheelchairs when I go to the doctor’s office. I can’t walk from the car to the room. I mean, I’m still in this. Nothing magical happened when she said, ‘You don’t have MS.’ Nothing magical happened,” she added.
In 2021, the Dead to Me actor announced her condition in a post on X, writing, “Hi friends. A few months ago I was diagnosed with MS.”
“It’s been a strange journey. But I have been so supported by people that I know who also have this condition,” her post continued. “It’s been a tough road. But as we all know, the road keeps going. Unless some asshole blocks it.”
By November 2022, Applegate told the New York Times that she lost the ability to walk without a cane as a result of her MS diagnosis.
“This is the first time anyone’s going to see me the way I am,” Applegate told the New York Times. “I put on 40 pounds; I can’t walk without a cane. I want people to know that I am very aware of all of that.”
MS is a degenerative disease that attacks the central nervous system. It can affect vision, memory, balance and mobility and common symptoms include muscle stiffness, vertigo and cognitive impairment. Currently, there is no cure, according to the MS Society of Canada.
Canada has one of the highest rates of MS in the world, with an estimated 90,000 people living with the disease, according to the MS Society of Canada. On average, the organization states, 12 Canadians are diagnosed with MS every day, with most diagnosed between the ages of 20 and 49.
—With files from The Associated Press
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