Christina Applegate says her MS diagnosis was wrong, and she still doesn't know what she has

Christina Applegate says her MS diagnosis was wrong, and she still doesn't know what she has

For five years, Christina Applegate was one of the most recognizable advocates for people living with multiple sclerosis. She had the "FU MS" cane at the SAGs. She wrote a memoir. She co-hosted a podcast, MeSsy, with Sopranos actress Jamie-Lynn Sigler, built almost entirely around the experience of living with the disease. Then, a few weeks ago, her doctor walked into her hospital room and told her she doesn't have it.

Applegate, 54, who was first diagnosed with MS in 2021, revealed the update on Tuesday, October 21, returning to MeSsy after a seven-month absence due to worsening health issues. The episode dropped with almost no advance warning. By that evening, it was everywhere.

In an emotional two-part episode, Applegate described the moment her doctor delivered the news: "She came into my room and said, 'Congratulations, you don't have MS.' I was, like, not happy at all," she told Sigler on the podcast. That sentence pretty much broke the internet.

The response was confusion, not relief. And Applegate explained exactly why.

"You don't get misdiagnosed and then all of the sudden I'm better. I haven't gotten better," she said. "If anything, I've gotten worse in some ways. So I'm back at square one, that I don't know what's going on with me."

Recent testing utilizing new technology led to the conclusion that she does not have MS, according to CNN. The Hollywood Reporter confirmed it was advances in brain MRI technology that produced the revised finding. But what the scans do show remains unclear. Applegate said on the podcast: "It's clear now that they're finding something different. Something else is going on."

During the second episode of the podcast return, Applegate and Sigler were joined by Dr. Marwa Kaisey, a top neurologist at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, who spoke to the broader diagnostic challenge. The National Multiple Sclerosis Society has noted that "currently, there is no single test to diagnose MS," and that clinicians weigh medical history, symptoms, neurological exams, MRI findings, and other diagnostic results together, per Newsweek's reporting on the episode.

What makes the story especially hard to sit with is the human cost of those five years under the wrong label. Her symptoms included hospitalization-level pain, incontinence, and radiation treatment. She gained 45 pounds from a combination of steroids and immobility, according to TODAY's timeline of her health journey. After her 2021 diagnosis, Applegate started infusions that went on for years, which she said wreaked "havoc" on her body, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Applegate said the change in diagnosis has taken an emotional toll. She told Sigler and their audience that she felt she had "let everybody down" after she and Sigler became prominent public voices discussing MS, per Newsweek. On the podcast, she said: "It's like I feel like I let everybody down, you know? It's this weird feeling of I became like, you and I, the poster children for MS."

Sigler pushed back gently. "What you're feeling is real, and you can't take that away because you don't have the MS diagnosis around it," Sigler told her, according to TODAY.

Applegate assured Sigler and her audience that the podcast will continue. Her health journey, she said, "is the same game with a different name," according to Deadline.

On the podcast, Applegate also revealed that she still has "every symptom of someone with MS" and said the shocking news of her misdiagnosis has left her with more questions than answers, ABC News reported.

The internet's reaction split fast. Some people focused on the diagnostic system that failed her. On a separate but parallel story also breaking this week, best friend Tiara Ramos, mourning the death of Real World and The Challenge alum Anika Rashaun from stage 4 breast cancer at 34, said Rashaun's mother had previously had breast cancer but Rashaun had never been identified as high-risk or advised to prioritize mammograms. Two major celebrity health stories dropping within 72 hours of each other, both raising the same uncomfortable question about what the medical system misses and who bears the cost when it does.

Back to Applegate: she noted on the podcast that "there's a pretty damn high number of misdiagnoses with MS," suggesting it's not a rare occurrence. Her doctors will continue to investigate what has been causing her health problems since 2021, per Newsweek.

Applegate has been open throughout, including writing about life with her diagnosis in her 2026 memoir, You With the Sad Eyes. That book is now, quietly, a different kind of document than it was a month ago.

She still uses a wheelchair at doctor's offices. She still can't walk from the car to the exam room. The diagnosis changed. The body didn't.

Sources

• Deadline: "Christina Applegate Reveals MS Misdiagnosis: 'I Am Back At Square One'"
• The Hollywood Reporter: "Christina Applegate Reveals She Does Not Have MS, Was Misdiagnosed"
• CNN: "Christina Applegate, a leading MS advocate, says doctors found she doesn't have the disease after all"
• ABC News: "Christina Applegate says she was misdiagnosed with MS"
• TODAY: "Christina Applegate Tearfully Shares She Was Misdiagnosed With MS"
• TMZ: "Christina Applegate Reveals She Does NOT Have Multiple Sclerosis"
• Newsweek: "Christina Applegate was Misdiagnosed With MS, Why It's Difficult to Diagnose"
• Thought Catalog: "Real World and Challenge Alum Anika Rashaun Has Died at 34"