Celebrity3 min(s) read
Christina Applegate reveals fresh health challenges after misdiagnosis as it now takes her 10 minutes to get out of bed
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Christina Applegate has revealed the health problems she has been struggling with since being misdiagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS).
The actress has told fans that she’s ‘back at square one’, and that her condition is getting worse, despite having no idea what it really is.
Applegate, 54, revealed that her day-to-day challenges are getting worse, as her mobility has become incredibly limited.
Speaking on her MeSsy podcast, which she co-hosts with Jamie-Lynn Sigler, the Anchorman star shared that it took her 10 minutes to get out of bed.
It's an issue that she never had before, as she revealed that she now also needs a walker to get around her house.
Applegate said it's obvious that her condition isn't improving, though she still doesn't know what she has exactly.
Christina Applegate opens up about condition
Applegate made a return to the MeSsy podcast after a seven-month absence, revealing in back-to-back episodes that she had taken time out.
In that time, she was told by her doctor that she doesn’t actually have MS, and needed time to process the life-changing news.
It turned out that all of her symptoms, which she has been experiencing since 2021, are not actually MS at all.
Tearfully explaining how she found out, Applegate said: “She came into my room and said, ‘Congratulations, you don’t have MS,’
"I was, like, not happy at all. Everybody else was so happy.”
Now, Applegate is trying to figure out what is going on, and what her condition really is.
The Jesse star admitted she feels as if she’s ‘let everybody down’ after the podcasters had become the ‘poster children’ for MS.
She explained: "I had a reason… as to why my day sucked every day,
“Now I don’t have a reason and it’s very unnerving and it’s very confusing for me.”
Doctor revealed complexities of MS
Dr Marwa Kaisey, a neurology specialist at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, made an appearance on the show and explained that MS misdiagnoses aren't uncommon.
She highlighted that there isn't ‘one single test for MS’, adding: "It’s not like we have something like a pregnancy test that says, ‘Yes. You have it.’ ‘No. You don’t.’ It’s a list of criteria.”
Apparently, nearly 20 percent of those diagnosed with MS don't actually have it.
“Almost one in five of these people who’d been told they had MS, some for decades, didn’t actually have it, and a majority of them were on medication to treat their MS,” Dr Kaisey said.
Applegate admitted of her symptoms: "You don’t get misdiagnosed and then all of a sudden I’m better,
"I haven’t gotten better, Jamie! If anything, I’ve gotten worse.
"So I’m back at square one where I don’t know what’s going on with me, and that’s going to be an online investigation that my doctors are going to be getting into just to find out what has been going on since 2021. Why did this happen?”
The actress sadly revealed that she has gone through 'a great depression' because of the recent turn of events, adding: "But I lost everything. I lost my job.
"Nothing magical happened when she said, ‘You don’t have MS.’ Nothing magical happened,” she stated.