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Christina Applegate, who became a prominent voice for multiple sclerosis awareness after her 2021 diagnosis, says doctors have now told her she doesn’t have the disease, leaving her with no explanation for her symptoms.
The Emmy winner shared the news Tuesday on her podcast "MeSsy," co-hosted by actor Jamie-Lynn Sigler, who has relapsing MS.
Applegate was in tears as she described being "back at square one."
Her doctor delivered the news with the words, "Congratulations, you don’t have MS," but relief never came. Her condition hasn’t improved and in some ways has worsened. "I still have to use wheelchairs when I go to the doctor’s office," she told Sigler. "I can’t walk from the car to the room."
She said she first received the diagnosis in 2021, after a doctor showed her brain scans with dozens of lesions. She said she had "every single" symptom of MS. A study of her case began a couple of years ago after cell testing produced unexpected results.
Her doctors plan to investigate what has been causing her symptoms since 2021.
Applegate said she felt she had let people down after she and Sigler became "poster children" for MS. She also worried that people might think she was faking her illness
Applegate published a memoir, "You With the Sad Eyes," in March. In an interview promoting it, she said she was largely confined to bed.
She retired from acting in 2023 after finishing "Dead to Me." She is also known for the film "Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy," and she won a 2002 Emmy for a guest role on "Friends."
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