Hollywood star Christina Applegate has revealed she is being tested for lupus, Lyme disease and rheumatoid arthritis after learning she was wrongly diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. The 54-year-old opened up on the latest episode of her podcast MeSsy, released this week, admitting she now feels like a “fraud” in the MS community she was part of for years.
The Married… with Children and Dead To Me actress went public with an MS diagnosis in August 2021. Last month, she stunned fans by announcing on the podcast that doctors had told her she did not have the condition after all.
Christina Applegate: ‘Tested for all that stuff’
Speaking on the show, which she co-hosts with The Sopranos actress Jamie-Lynn Sigler, Applegate explained that medics are now looking at illnesses that can produce symptoms similar to MS.
“So now I’m being tested for all that stuff, slowly but surely,” she said, according to the Press Association.
Lupus and rheumatoid arthritis are both autoimmune conditions, while Lyme disease is an infection usually picked up from a tick bite. All three can cause problems that overlap with those seen in MS.
Struggling with her identity
The latest episode featured Jack Osbourne, son of Ozzy and Sharon, who was diagnosed with MS in 2012. When Osbourne admitted that he sometimes felt a little like a fraud at MS events, Applegate quipped back.
“Talk about being a fraud. I don’t even have it anymore,” she said, as reported by the Daily Beast.
She explained that after living as someone with MS for almost six years, it was hard to let go of that part of herself, and said she had serious work to do on her mindset. Sigler and Osbourne reassured her that she would always be an honorary member of the community, according to TMZ.
Applegate also said she had made lifelong friends through the MS world and intended to stay involved with it in some way.
Symptoms still worsening
Despite the change in diagnosis, the star’s health problems have not gone away. The Daily Beast reported that she has previously described needing a wheelchair at the doctor’s office because she cannot walk from her car to the consulting room.
In late October she said it had taken her ten minutes to get up from her pillow, that she now keeps a walker beside her bed, and that she has been losing too much weight.
Recalling the moment she learned the news, she said her doctor walked into the room and congratulated her on not having MS, but added that nothing magical happened afterwards.
A career put on hold
Christina Applegate first spoke publicly about her health while filming the third and final series of Netflix hit Dead To Me, and said at the time that it would probably be her last on-screen role.
For now, doctors are continuing their search for what is behind her symptoms, with Applegate sharing each step of the process with listeners of her podcast.
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Sources: The Irish News (PA), The Daily Beast, TMZ
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