Autumn has arrived, and that signals the long-waited return of The Great British Bake Off. Fans of the show get to avidly witness the bakers silently hope for an elusive Paul Hollywood handshake each week, while fending off cheesy puns from hosts Noel Fielding and Alison Hammond.
It's not just the technical and visual brilliance of the brilliant bakes on offer on the show that grab the attention of viewers, the bakers themselves are often just as exciting to watch.
Jasmine Mitchell is already a firm favourite with Bake Off enthusiasts - her infectious personality and incredible skill have already put her firmly in the running to bake her way to the finals. During week three's Bread Week, she deservedly won Star Baker for her consistently excellent performance across all tasks.
It was during Bread Week that the baking hopeful addressed her hair loss and the alopecia diagnosis that caused it. Chatting to the cameras while plaiting a loaf, Jasmine quipped, "Ironic that I'm plaiting when I have no hair to plait myself."
She continued to discuss how she came to lose her hair and how she feels about letting go of the wigs and embracing her baldness.
"I had my own hair until I was 12," Jasmine explains. "The doctors didn't really know why, nobody knows what causes alopecia," she said of the condition.
"There was nothing that triggered it, I just randomly started losing my hair," she added.
Continuing to chat about her feelings towards losing her hair, Jasmine revealed that it's only been within the last couple of years that she's stopped wearing wigs.
"It was really hard at the start, going out without wearing a wig," she told the cameras. The hopeful baker added, "but I feel like I'm getting to the point where I genuinely enjoy not having hair and being different."
Born in Edinburgh, Jasmine now lives in London and is training to be a doctor herself. She cites baking as being her creative outlet, and she's certainly making waves with both her skill and personality on the show - and now for raising awareness about hair loss.
According to NHS Inform, alopecia can happen at any age and very is known about it - it's thought to be an autoimmune disorder, although even this is yet to be verified.
As a possible autoimmune condition, this means the immune system could be mistakenly attacking the hair follicle.
It usually causes small, round patches of baldness on the scalp. However, it can affect other areas such as eyebrows and eyelashes and in cases like Jasmine's, can affect the entire scalp and sometimes, the entire body.
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