The Dead to Me star said, “Shooting the show was the hardest thing I’d ever done in my life”
Christina Applegate is continuing to open up about her life with multiple sclerosis, especially the time right after she was diagnosed when she was suffering through debilitating symptoms while filming the final season of Dead to Me.
Last week, Applegate appeared on The Kelly Clarkson Show, where she candidly shared new details about that time. “Shooting the show was the hardest thing I’d ever done in my life because I was diagnosed during shooting,” she said. “I didn’t know what was happening to me.”
Applegate clarified that there are different types of MS, and even the same type can affect different people in myriad ways. “Not everyone is the same,” she said. “Everyone’s symptoms are different. Everyone’s experience with it is different. Every day is different.”
For her, Applegate explained, one of the earliest symptoms of the disease was difficulty walking. It was so extreme, she said, that she needed to use a wheelchair to get around the Dead to Me set. “Can I say it sucked balls?” she asked Clarkson.
Since her diagnosis, Applegate said, she’s been using her trademark humor to help cope with new obstacles and challenges. “My humor shield keeps me OK,” she explained. “But of course, down on the insides, you feel the things. I do it to kind of deflect and also make people not scared to be around me. When people see me now as a disabled person, I want them to feel comfortable that we can laugh about it.”
Applegate even joked that she wrote herself a theme song centered around her disability, sung to the tune of “Santa Baby.” “I have a song that I wrote called ‘Dis-aby Baby,” she said, before singing, “Hurry down the chimney tonight, I can’t because my wheelchair won’t fit down it.” (It sounds better when she sings it.)
Applegate has been open with fans ever since she revealed her diagnosis last summer. She’s opened up many times about the challenges she faced filming Dead Like Me while battling her symptoms. And last month, she made her first public appearance since the summer—she accepted her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame while using a cane and walking barefoot because shoes were too painful to wear.
Barefoot. For some with MS the feeling of shoes may hurt or make us feel off balance. So today I was me. Barefoot pic.twitter.com/eJBGg1Wyug
— christina applegate (@1capplegate) November 15, 2022
“For some with MS, the feeling of shoes may hurt or make us feel off balance. So today I was me. Barefoot,” she wrote on Twitter at the time.
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