Why Christina Applegate Gives a “Disclaimer” to Friends Amid MS Battle
Originally appeared on E! Online
Christina Applegate is hoping that friends can give her some grace.
The Dead to Me star—who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2021—recently shared that making plans with friends looks a little different these days.
“I just say to people,” the 52-year-old said on the Aug. 20 episode of her podcast MeSsy with Christina Applegate & Jamie-Lynn Sigler, “I hope you give me the grace of canceling right before.”
So even though the Anchorman alum admitted she loves to stay home in bed, she is still willing to go out with friends, albeit with the “disclaimer.”
“I always say, ‘Sure, if you want to go to lunch, just know—and you have to know this and you can't be mad at me—that if right before you come to pick me up, if I say, ‘Can't do it,’ you can't be mad,'” she explained. “It's my little disclaimer.”
She continued, “If I’m puking, or I can't walk, you think I'm going to go out to a restaurant or go do anything? No, I'm not going to do that.”
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Christina was also open about the toll MS—an autoimmune disorder that attacks the central nervous system and erodes the ability for impulses to travel between one’s nerves and their brain, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine—has taken on her body.
“I have no muscles in my legs, which I showed you. I look like Humpty Dumpty, like my little tiny weird legs and then my big menopausal belly,” she told her cohost, referencing her lack of physical activity because of her disease. “Like if I go up a hill, my heart starts beating really fast and I think I'm going to have a heart attack because my heart's just... the muscle isn't there.”
The Married…With Children alum, though, recently shared how she finds relief from the difficulties of the illness.
“I find reality television very useful. That’s kind of it for me,” Christina told James Corden during his SiriusXM show This Life of Mine. “Give me any of it. Give me a Vanderpump [Rules], give me a Below Deck, give me a [Real] Housewife, even give me Kitchen Nightmares with Gordon Ramsay—I'll watch like nine seasons of that in like two days.”
Read on to see more of Christina’s journey with multiple sclerosis.
Health Journey
Christina Applegate shared she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2021.
"Hi friends. A few months ago I was diagnosed with MS," she shared on her social media channels that August. "It's been a strange journey. But I have been so supported by people that I know who also have this condition. It's been a tough road. But as we all know, the road keeps going. Unless some a--hole blocks it."
First Public Appearance
"Oh, by the way, I have a disease," she joked during her November 2022 Hollywood Walk of Fame induction ceremony, her first public appearance since her MS diagnosis. "Did you not notice? I'm not even wearing shoes."
Early Symptoms
Christina believes her MS journey actually began "six or seven years" before her 2021 diagnosis.
"I noticed, especially the first season [of Dead to Me], we'd be shooting and my leg would buckle," Christina explained during a March 2024 interview on Good Morning America. "I really just put it off as being tired, or I'm dehydrated, or it's the weather. Then nothing would happen for months, and I didn't pay attention."
By the time she was shooting the Netflix series' third and final season, the actress said she was "being brought to set in a wheelchair."
"I couldn't move that far," she recalled, "so I had to tell everybody because I needed help."
Making Moves
The Dead to Me star captioned this photo of her cane collection amid her battle with MS: "Walking sticks are now part of my new normal."
Strong Statement
Joined by her daughter Sadie Grace LeNoble, Christina had a simple message for multiple sclerosis while attending the 2023 SAG Awards: "F U MS."
Just Jokes
After a receiving standing ovation at the 2023 Emmys, the Married...With Children alum quipped, "You're totally shaming me with disability by standing up."
Healing Through Humor
"I make these jokes because if I don't, I'll suffocate," Christina shared on a March 2024 episode on Armchair Expert, explaining why she often pokes fun at her condition. "I'll be done."
MS On Her Mind
"I have 30 lesions on my brain," she said on the same podcast. "My biggest one is behind my right eye, so my right eye hurts a lot."
Legions are caused by the immune system attacking the myelin sheath around nerves, according to the Multiple Sclerosis Trust.
Getting Candid
Christina hasn’t held back when it comes to sharing her journey.
"It sucks," the Anchorman actress told late night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel of her daily struggles with MS. "I'm not going to lie. I think anyone who has MS isn't going to be like, 'This is the best thing that ever happened to me!'"
In Her Bubble
When talking about her day-to-day life with the disease, Christina told Good Morning America in March 2024, "I live kind of in hell."
"But I might get to a place where I function a little bit better," she added. "Right now, I'm isolating, and that's kind of how I'm dealing with it—by not going anywhere because I don't want to do it. It's hard."
The Sweetest Support
Christina credited her Sweetest Thing costar Selma Blair—who was diagnosed with MS in 2018—for urging her to get tested for the disease.
"She said, 'You need to get checked for MS,'" Christina recalled during her GMA interview. "If not for her, it could've been way worse."
Friendship Never Dies
Christina confirmed that Dead to Me will likely be her last onscreen credit, telling Vanity Fair in May 2023, "I can’t even imagine going to set right now."
"I’m probably not going to work on-camera again, but I'm so glad that I went out with someone who is by far the greatest actress I’ve ever worked with in my entire life," she said of costar Linda Cardellini, "if not the greatest human I’ve ever known.
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