Jada Pinkett Smith in tears for alopecia victim who died by suicide over bullying

Jada Pinkett Smith, who has been open about her own struggles with alopecia, broke down as she spoke to the mother of a 12-year-old who killed herself after suffering from the condition.

On Wednesday’s episode of Red Table Talk, the 50-year-old actress along with her daughter Willow Smith and her mother Adrienne Banfield-Norris, sat down with bereaved mother Niki Ball. 

The girl, identified as Allred, ended her life after suffering from alopecia – a condition for which she was relentlessly mocked and bullied.

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“With the hair loss, she was so strong,” Ball said of Rio in the clip from the episode first obtained by People.

“She still rocked it even when it was falling out, and she just had these big bald patches. Tried the creams. They made her break out. Tried the injections, she took five of them in one day. But neither of them really did anything.”

“The kids at school called Rio a “naked mole rat,” a “bug-eyed alien” and “Mr. and Mrs. Clean,” she adds.

“Three weeks before her death, Rio had a really bad day at school and just lost it” when she got in the car to go home. “I knew this was very serious,” Ball says.

On March 14, 2022, Rio died by suicide. 

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“She was so smart. She was just brilliant,” Ball said. “And she was funny. She was a great big sister. She loved reading and writing and sketching. She loved being in the band.”

Pinkett Smith was left in tears after hearing about Rio. The actress said that Rio’s story is one of the reasons why people “need an understanding around the devastation of this condition.”

Alopecia is an autoimmune disorder that causes one’s hair to fall off. Pinkett Smith has suffered from the illness since 2018.

The interest surrounding the hair condition intensified after  Pinkett Smith’s shaved head was teased by comedian Chris Rock at the 2022 Oscars on March 28 which resulted in Will Smith storming on stage and slapping the host.

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The 57-year-old comedian suggested at the time that Pinkett Smith looked like “GI Jane.”

Pinkett Smith had first addressed her struggles with alopecia back in 2018 when she spoke on Facebook about the moment she started losing hair.

“It was terrifying when it first started,” Jada shared. “I was in the shower one day and had just handfuls of hair in my hands and I was just like, ‘Oh my god, am I going bald?'”