Following the revelation of her diagnosis, Pressley said she felt like she owed little girls who had been inspired by her natural hair an explanation.

She also said she was still striving to make peace with the diagnosis, given how much her hair has been a part of her identity as a black woman in politics.

In a video with The Root, she said: “My twists have become such a synonymous and a conflated part of not only my personal identity and how I show up in the world, but also my political brand. And that’s why I think it’s important that I’m transparent about this new normal and living with alopecia.”

Alopecia – the medical term for baldness – affects as many as 6.8 million people in the US, according to the National Alopecia Areata Foundation.

In the interview, Pressley talked about how she had been overwhelmed by the support she had received from women after she started wearing her hair in Senegalese twists. “Little girls were wearing T-shirts that said, ‘My congresswoman wears braids’,” Pressley said. “We received letters from all over the globe from women who talk about their own emancipation, that they felt I’ve given them permission.”

Ayanna Pressley is trying to make peace with her alopecia, so why are some people making it harder?