The short version
- Film and TV star Christina Applegate (52) was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in the summer of 2021
- She talks unfiltered and honestly about her challenges in the podcast “Messy”
- The actor experiences intense pain, tingling and numbness in his body and is unable to shower
- Applegate has not taken on an assignment since the last season of “Dead To Me” in 2022
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The film and TV star was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in the summer of 2021, and since then his health has deteriorated rapidly.
These days it’s extra bad, she confides in her own podcast “Messy”. When podcast partner Jamie Lynn-Sigler (42), also affected by MS, asks how things are going, Applegate replies:
– Do you want an honest answer? Very bad. I’m experiencing a pretty heavy backlash right now.
Not sleeping
The 52-year-old explains that she has more intense pain in her legs than ever before, and that she is unable to go to the bathroom without feeling like she is going to fall. Tingling and the numbness in the body also bother her.
– I have been awake for more than 24 hours now, because my right eye does some strange things every time I close my eyes to sleep.
Multiple sclerosisMS is a chronic inflammatory disease in which the body’s own immune system attacks the insulating material myelin in the brain and spinal cord. MS affects between 500 and 550 people in Norway each year. Around 14,000 live with the disease in Norway today. The most typical symptoms are numbness, visual disturbances, reduced walking function, paralysis of the arms and legs, balance problems, dizziness, problems with fine motor skills and chronic fatigue (fatigue). The course and symptoms of the disease differ from person to person. (Source: MS association) is a chronic inflammatory disease of the central nervous system, where the body’s own immune system attacks tissue in the brain and spinal cord.
Applegate does not hold back when she describes the challenges the disease is causing right now. With a clearly serious undertone, she jokes that she should buy shares in the wet wipes manufacturer Cottonelle.
– Because I haven’t showered in three weeks. Since I can’t stand in the shower, there’s no damn way I can shower.
Applegate says she has to use wet wipes instead. The chair she used to sit on in the shower doesn’t work now.
– It’s so small, and since my bottom is so big these days, I can’t sit on it. I slip right off. Thank you, God, that I am always alone, so no one but Sades can smell me, she says.
Sades is the daughter Sadie (12), who the star has with her husband Martyn LeNoble (54).
– Terrifying
Applegate has stated that there is great uncertainty about whether she will ever be able to work again. But she has not spoken to a doctor about the sudden decline.
– I texted them yesterday, but haven’t received a reply yet. But I’ll have to check it out, because it’s a little scary. It also freaks me out when it seems like my eye is going to pop out of my face or something.
She also worries a lot about losing feeling in her legs.
– I don’t know what is happening. My legs are just…done.
MS affects differently from person to person. from person to person, and Jamie Lynn-Sigler, also an actress, explains that she has much better days than Applegate.
Applegate, for her part, is clearly moved when she talks about the anxiety of being a burden, and the uncertainty around answering honestly when people ask how things are going.
– Because most people didn’t want to hear the answer. But I feel bad.
Applegate uses a cane, and she only just managed to finish the third and final season of the Netflix series “Dead To Me” in 2022. She has not taken on any assignments after that.
The days are now largely spent lying in a dark room and watching TV – and hoping that everything will pass. She reveals that she only has two people in her life whom she considers friends.
The actor has also experienced serious illness in the past. In 2008, she developed breast cancer and had both breasts removed.
The 52-year-old started her career as a teenager, and is also known from, among other things, the role of Kelly Bundy in “Married … with Children (Our worst year)”. She has also appeared in comedies such as “Bad Moms”, “Anchorman” and “Hall Pass”.
Here are glimpses from “Anchorman”:
