Christina Applegate has revealed her 13-year-old daughter Sadie has been diagnosed with postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS).
The chronic disorder affects the autonomic nervous system and blood circulation, which can cause dizziness, fainting, chest pain, shortness of breath, tremors, and sweating.
Sadie’s POTS announcement is the latest health issue for the Applegate family and comes after her mother, 52, was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2021 – an immune disorder that disrupts the central nervous system and has left her with mobility issues and chronic eye pain.
Speaking on her MeSsy podcast, which Applegate co-hosts with her friend and fellow MS survivor Jamie-Lynn Sigler, the Dead to Me actor admitted she felt heartbroken for her child.
Explaining her condition to listeners, Sadie said: “I have something called POTS… When I stand up, I get really, really dizzy, and my legs get really weak, and I feel like I’m going to pass out.”
Applegate responded: “I hate it for you, my darling. I really hate it for you. I’m sad. But I love you, and I know you’re going to be OK. And I’m here for you, and I believe you. And thank you for bringing this to light and awareness.”
The actor’s daughter went on to explain that she had been suffering with POTS symptoms for a long time, but they were often dismissed by school teachers who thought she was trying to avoid her classes.
“If I were to stand up then, I would be like, ‘I have to go to the nurse. I can’t do this,’” Sadie said. “Or I’ll be in PE, and I’ll be like, ‘I have to go to the nurse.’”
She said she was often accused of making up symptoms to “‘get out of class’” and told it was “probably just anxiety”.
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“They wouldn’t do anything for it,” Sadie continued. “Them not doing anything about it definitely hurt me physically and emotionally. Because I was just like, ‘This is rude, and I feel sick, and you’re telling me to go to PE and run laps around the football field. I can’t do that.’”
Applegate expressed guilt that she had also ignored her daughter’s symptoms at home. “I feel so horrible I didn’t pay attention to it,” she said. “I just didn’t see it at home, babe. At home, you were fine.”
The actor likened her daughter’s condition to her own experience of MS, adding: “It’s kind of like us, we get out in the world, and the stresses and the anxiety of the world bring upon our symptoms much worse than they would be if we were in the safety and the coolness of our own homes.”
Sadie said she was thankful for how her POTS had helped her relate to her mother’s MS.
“When my mom’s like, ‘Oh, I’m kind of in pain right now. Oh, I’m having tremors.’ If I didn’t have this, I probably would be like, ‘I don’t really care. I don’t know what you’re talking about,’” she said.
In August 2021, Applegate revealed she had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis a few months earlier, explaining that production on Netflix’s Dead to Me had to be halted for five months when she began treatment.
During an appearance on Good Morning America in March, Applegate said that although she got her official diagnosis in 2021, she is likely to have had it “six or seven years” before.
“I noticed, especially the first season, we’d be shooting and my leg would buckle,” she said, referring to Dead to Me.
“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.”
