Christina Applegate, 54, Reveals Five-Year MS Diagnosis Was Wrong

Christina Applegate, 54, said on Tuesday's episode of her "MeSsy" podcast that a doctor told her she does not have multiple sclerosis — five years after she was first diagnosed with the disease, Page Six reported. The actress said her symptoms have not improved and, by her account, have gotten worse since the reversal.

What did Applegate say happened with her diagnosis?

Applegate recounted a doctor entering her hospital room and saying, "Congratulations, you don't have MS," according to the podcast episode cited by Page Six. She said the news did not bring relief. "I was, like, not happy at all. Everybody else was so happy," she said. Applegate pushed back on the idea that removing a diagnosis equals removing the illness: "You don't get misdiagnosed and then all of the sudden I'm better. I haven't gotten better. If anything, I've gotten worse."

When was she first diagnosed, and what changed five years later?

Applegate received her original MS diagnosis roughly five years before this week's podcast disclosure, per Page Six's report. The outlet noted she described her overall health crisis as running since 2021. With the MS label now removed, Applegate said she and her physicians are starting over on identifying a cause. "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?" she said.

How has the health saga affected her career and daily life?

Applegate, an Emmy winner for "Dead to Me," said the toll has been financial and professional as well as physical. "I lost everything. I lost my job," she said on the podcast, adding that she experienced what she called "a great depression" tied to the illness. She said mobility remains a daily obstacle regardless of the diagnostic change: "I still have to use wheelchairs when I go to the doctor's office. I can't walk from the car to the room." Page Six's prior coverage has tracked a nearly four-month hospital stay and her return home to her daughter, underscoring how long the symptoms have persisted independent of the MS label.

Does she still identify with the MS community she was once known in?

Applegate also addressed losing her place in a patient community she said she had become a public face for. She was previously described, in her own words, as a kind of "poster child" for MS awareness; now, without that diagnosis, she said she no longer fits in that space — even as her physical symptoms continue unresolved.

What happens next for her diagnosis search?

No new diagnosis has been announced. Applegate said the medical reassessment beginning now will look back at the full period since 2021 to determine what has actually been driving her symptoms, a process she characterized as starting over rather than closing a chapter. "Nothing magical happened when she said, 'You don't have MS.' Nothing magical happened," Applegate said.