Christina Applegate, a guest on Dax Shepard’s Armchair Expert podcast this week, gave an update on her multiple sclerosis (MS) battle.
Actress Christina Applegate, 52, says uses her sense of humor to cope — revealed, ‘I have 30 lesions on my brain. My biggest one is behind my right eye, so my right eye hurts a lot.’
The longtime performer, who was diagnosed with MS in 2021, called the condition the ‘worst thing that’s happened’ in her ‘entire life.’
Although Applegate’s vision is still intact, she described another side effect she experiences.
‘My hand starts to go weird and then I’ll get a seizure-y feeling sometimes in my brain,’, the Dead to Me actress shared.
Multiple sclerosis is a condition in which the immune system attacks the body and causes nerve damage to the brain and spinal cord.
Applegate also admitted to being the ‘worst MSer’ as she prefers to go back to bed instead of stretching her muscles when dealing with pain.
She likened MS to a ‘mean girl’ who ‘pushes back’ if she overexerts herself.
‘It sucks,’ Christina said plainly. ‘I hate it so much. I’m so mad about it. You can’t overcome it.’
Previously, the Anchorman star triumphed over ʙʀᴇᴀsᴛ ᴄᴀɴᴄᴇʀ, but said ‘everything I was saying was a freaking lie’ when she was going through it.
‘It was me trying to convince myself of something, and I think that did no service to anyone,’ she reflected, noting that she now wants to be up front about her experience with multiple sclerosis.
In 2008 she had a double ᴍᴀsᴛᴇᴄᴛᴏᴍʏ to remove ʙʀᴇᴀsᴛ ᴄᴀɴᴄᴇʀ.
Then, in 2017 she also had her ᴏᴠᴀʀɪᴇs and ғᴀʟʟᴏᴘɪᴀɴ tubes removed as a precaution against ᴏᴠᴀʀɪᴀɴ ᴄᴀɴᴄᴇʀ.
Applegate shared that she relies on humor to deal with multiple sclerosis while promoting her new podcast on Jimmy Kimmel Live this month.
She joked with Jimmy about her condition after walking onto the stage with a cane.
‘I was thinking wouldn’t it be funny if I came out and I did a somersault like Willy Wonka? And then I was like ta-da! You’d be ”What a b****. She is such a liar.” I’m not. I literally am disabled,’ Christina said.
‘I learned from our text exchanges you have a very sick sense of humor,’ Jimmy said.
‘It’s how I live. It’s how I keep myself okay,’ she replied.
