Christina Applegate Reveals Multiple Sclerosis Misdiagnosis

Actor Christina Applegate has revealed that doctors determined she does not have multiple sclerosis (MS), reversing a diagnosis she received in 2021. The Emmy-winning star shared the news on Tuesday in an episode of her MeSsy podcast with fellow actor Jamie-Lynn Sigler, explaining that her persistent symptoms and mobility difficulties remain unexplained.

Applegate, 54, said the revised diagnosis has left her uncertain about the cause of her health problems. Despite the new findings, she continues to experience significant physical limitations and sometimes relies on a wheelchair to attend medical appointments.

During the podcast, Applegate described the emotional impact of losing the explanation she had relied on for years.

“I’m back at square one – that I don’t know what’s going on with me,” Applegate said through tears.

She recalled learning about the revised diagnosis during a doctor's appointment.

“She came into my room and said, ‘Congratulations – you don’t have MS.’ I was not happy at all.”

Applegate emphasized that the change in diagnosis had not improved her physical condition.

“You don’t get misdiagnosed, and all of a sudden I’m better. I haven’t gotten better, Jamie. If anything, I’ve gotten worse in some ways.”

She said she still struggles to walk from a car into a doctor's office and continues to experience symptoms despite the new medical information.

“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’m still in this.

Nothing magical happened when she said, ‘You don’t have MS.’ Nothing magical happened.”

Applegate also described feeling conflicted about her public role in raising awareness of the disease after sharing her experiences with the MS community.

“It’s weird because I feel like I let everybody down. It’s this weird feeling of like I became this, you and I, the poster children for MS. All that I did, everything that I was doing, I had a fucking reason as to why my day sucked every day.”

She said the absence of a definitive explanation has made her situation particularly difficult to understand.

“And now I don’t have a reason. It’s very unnerving and it’s really confusing for me.”

Applegate announced her original MS diagnosis in 2021. She later discussed the condition in interviews promoting her memoir, You With the Sad Eyes, published in March, and said she was largely confined to bed.

She recalled that a doctor had shown her images of dozens of lesions on her brain when initially diagnosing the disease.

“That was it right? That was my answer to everything going on,” Applegate said.

At the time, she believed the diagnosis explained her symptoms and said she began feeling accepted within the MS community as she continued treatment.

“I had every symptom of someone with MS. Every single one.”

Applegate said doctors began reviewing the diagnosis a couple of years ago after cell testing produced unexpected results. She now expects further investigation into what has happened since 2021.

“That’s going to be an online investigation my doctors are going to get into just to find out what has been happening since 2021. Why did this happen?”

The revised diagnosis also raises questions about the broader problem of MS misdiagnosis. Sigler, who disclosed her own diagnosis of relapsing multiple sclerosis in 2016, discussed the issue during the episode.

“We have come to learn this is not that rare of an occurrence, especially when it comes to MS,” Sigler said.

Applegate pointed to the possibility that some patients undergo treatment for years before discovering that another condition may explain their symptoms.

“There’s a pretty damn high number of misdiagnoses with MS, and that’s after people have been going through the process of it, with the infusions, for many years.”

She added that doctors were now investigating whether another condition could account for the symptoms previously attributed to MS.

“It’s clear now they’re finding something different, that something else is going on.”

Applegate said the new information has affected her confidence in understanding her own health, particularly because her symptoms have not disappeared.

“I’m sure people are saying like, ‘crybaby, you don’t have MS, you know, that’s a good thing’ – but no, no, no.”

She described continuing to experience exhaustion, problems with her legs and difficulties coping with heat, despite the revised diagnosis.

“I’m sitting here having slept all day yesterday, feeling like absolute crap because of the heat. My legs aren’t working. You know, all the same stuff is happening to me, and yet I have this thing of like, well, you don’t have that, so maybe you’re faking it.”

Applegate said the uncertainty had prompted her to question whether she was doing something wrong or could change her approach to managing her condition.

“In my head I’m like what can I be doing differently? This is what I’m sure a lot of people start thinking when they get their misdiagnoses. It’s like, ‘well, what have I done wrong? What am I doing?’”

Sigler responded by reassuring Applegate that the revised diagnosis did not invalidate her advocacy or the support she had provided to others.

“Everything you did, and shared, and were, and are, to so many people doesn’t go anywhere,” Sigler said.

She added that Applegate had not misled her audience by sharing what doctors had previously told her.

“Because of this misdiagnosis or this new information that you have in your life, that doesn’t take away anything that you did. You didn’t mislead anyone. In no way should you feel bad or uneasy about your continuing to share your journey with people.”

Applegate is known for Married … with Children, Dead to Me, Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy and Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead. She also appeared on Friends and won a 2002 Emmy for outstanding guest actress in a comedy series. She stepped away from acting after completing Dead to Me, following her 2021 diagnosis.

A 2024 Swiss-led study published in the Multiple Sclerosis Journal found substantial evidence of both MS misdiagnosis and underdiagnosis. The study reported a 15% misdiagnosis rate among the cases examined.