Christina Applegate missed significant MS symptom years before she got diagnosed with disease

When Christina Applegate was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis back in 2021, several things suddenly made sense.

The American actress had actually been battling a handful of symptoms of the chronic condition for years - one dating back to the day she filmed the pilot episode to her hit Netflix drama-comedy Dead To Me in 2019.

Speaking on her popular Messy podcast this week, the 53-year-old admitted to having overlooked one particularly prominent MS indicator entirely - something she's encouraging fellow sufferers not to neglect if they suspect the same condition.

Ever since receiving her diagnosis three years ago, the mother-of-one has used her platform to spread awareness of multiple sclerosis, which is is a life-long condition that sees the brain/spinal cord mistakenly attacked by the immune system.

As the NHS explains: "This damages and scars the sheath, and potentially the underlying nerves, meaning that messages travelling along the nerves become slowed or disrupted."

Applegate refuses to let her condition define her, however, and hopes to break down harmful stigmas.

As such, this week - alongside podcast co-host, actress and fellow MS sufferer Jamie-Lynn Sigler - she discussed some of the signs and symptoms she initially overlooked, including one which she dismissed entirely.

Speaking on Messy, she recalled filming what would be the first ever episode to Netflix's award-winning series Dead To Me, and stumbling to the ground.

Christina Applegate in 2019 following the release of Dead To Me (Jon Kopaloff/FilmMagic)

Telling viewers that she was asked to run across a field for a scene for the pilot, she added that she suddenly fell - which she now recognises as an early sign of her autoimmune condition.

"I remember falling that day," Applegate recalled "Hi, first sign of MS!"

Her close friend, Liz Feldman, who is also the creator of Dead To Me, was present during the moment and recounted: "I remember you losing your balance a couple of times but it was very hard to figure out.

"I remember one time it was like really late at night, we’d been shooting probably 14 or 15 hours, it seemed completely reasonable that anybody would be collapsing."

Discussing Applegate's diagnosis, Feldman continued: "There’s no handbook for this.

"I could just sense that A, she was scared and B, that something was wrong, something in her body was not working the way that she wanted it to. I told her so many times that it’s just a TV show; we’re making a TV show and it’s so silly, you know, at the end of the day!"

Applegate was diagnosed in 2021 (Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images for Critics Choice Association)

She added: "I knew Christina well enough to know that something major had to be going on because she’s an extreme professional."

Applegate took the moment to thank the show's producers for being so accommodating to her condition, especially when her mobility started declining towards the end of the show.

"That would not happen anywhere else," she praised. "So my gratitude toward you guys being humans - because you should be humans and love other humans! - is, like, I can’t even tell you, that’s not the normal reaction!"

Applegate previously recalled being able to 'brush off' the symptoms in January 2021, but just before she started shooting the third season of Dead To Me, she felt as though she had been 'hit by a truck and didn’t know what was going on'.

Speaking to Variety, Applegate shared: "It was very scary for me, because this body that I had known was no longer mine. We had to kind of work around that until, finally, I had answers.