Christina Applegate has spoken openly about the difficulties of living with multiple sclerosis and the signs of the disease – like numbness and tingling in her limbs – that set in years before she was officially diagnosed.
“I wish I was paying attention,” she said in an interview with The New York Times published Tuesday, “but who should I know?”
Applegate recalls feeling off balance while filming her Emmy-nominated Netflix series Dead To Me and struggling during a tennis match before receiving an official diagnosis on the set of her show. According to the Times, production was halted for nearly five months when she began treating the disease.
“There was a feeling of, ‘Well, let’s get her some medicine to make her feel better,'” the actress said. “And there is no better one. But it was good for me. I had to process my loss of my life, my loss of this part of me.”
Host Alyssa Mastromonaco, Christina Applegate, Linda Cardellini and creator Liz Feldman attend the ‘Dead To Me’ #NETFLIXFYSEE For Your Consideration panel at Netflix FYSEE on June 3, 2019 in Los Angeles, California. Amy Sussman via Getty Images
While there was some question as to whether filming on Dead To Me could resume, Applegate insisted they got their way, using a wheelchair to get to the set and having a friend occasionally keep her legs off camera. There were even some changes made to the script to accommodate energy and stamina during filming.
“I gained 40 pounds; I can’t walk without a cane. I want people to know that I’m aware of all of this,” Applegate said.
MS affects nearly 1 million adults in the US and can be disabling. Most people are diagnosed with MS between the ages of 20 and 40, and the disease is more common in women than men, according to the Cleveland Clinic, a nonprofit academic medical center. Symptoms can include numbness or weakness in the limbs, electric shocks that occur with neck movements, or tremors. MS can also impair vision and speech, cause dizziness and fatigue, and in cases like Applegate’s, affect general mobility.
There is no known cure for the disease. But according to the Mayo Clinic, treatments can help speed recovery from attacks.
Applegate has been transparent about her struggles living with MS on Twitter, sharing and recording photos of the aids she uses to walk insomnia that accompanies her diagnosis and even shows love for a Hollywood star Selma Blair, who was diagnosed with the disease in 2018.
Got it. Congratulations MS sister pic.twitter.com/UlsCPVXr82
— Christina Applegate (@1capplegate) May 20, 2022
Blair, who was a contestant on the current season of “Dancing with the Stars,” said the recent MRI results prompted her to leave the show, citing “bone trauma and inflammation between tears and tears” developing at continued exercise could worsen. Blair published a memoir called Mean Baby earlier this year that addresses her illness.
In 2021, Blair starred in a documentary chronicling her declining health following her diagnosis, Introducing, Selma Blair. Applegate praised Blair for her transparency, her wrote“My girl Selma Blair documented first year. That is hard.”
“Being technically disabled is what it is,” Applegate tweeted. “I didn’t know what MS was before I had it. My life has changed forever.”
Caitlin O’Kane contributed to this report.
More C. Mandler