To many of us, Mrs. Clinton was representative of every woman who’s been talked over or overlooked for a job, had her qualifications questioned, or been called a “bitch.” She was those times I was told I needed to be “nice,” and she stood for those women who were told they didn’t “look” like engineers (or in her case, presidential).

She was representative of those things in a country where the average person finds it easier to pair words like “president” and “executive” with male names and words like “assistant” and “aide” with female names. She represented female power in spite of the reality that a woman’s likability is inverse to her leadership status — that is, we like her less the more she rises — while the opposite is true for men.

She was running for president knowing all too well that a woman has to be twice as qualified to be perceived as once as good; and that her mistakes will be scrutinized more harshly and remembered longer than those of her male peers.

In 2008, as Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were neck and neck in the race for the Democratic nomination, researchers at the University of Texas conducted a study. They discovered that one in four elementary school students they surveyed believed it was illegal for a woman, an African-American or a Latino to be president.

It’s safe to say that President Obama shattered that misperception in 2008, as thousands of young minority children finally saw somebody who looked like them staring back at them from the Oval Office.

The fact is, seeing women in power matters.

According to a survey by the Geena Davis Institute, even viewing a female president on screen — that is, in television dramas and comedies — made people 68 percent more likely to vote for a female president. In real life, Mrs. Clinton’s candidacy prompted a quarter of girls ages 14 to 17 to say they were more likely to seek positions of leadership, according to a national online Pollfish poll conducted by The New York Times. As President Obama put it, “Her candidacy and nomination was historic and sends a message to our daughters all across the country that they can achieve at the highest levels of politics.”

I spent much of Tuesday morning scrolling through my Facebook feed, noting stories of friends who had brought their children — and in particular, their daughters — to the polls to cast their votes for the first female president. Twelve hours later, my feed was like a memorial page, parents trying to find the words to explain what had happened. Her loss is not as simple as gender, but as one little girl put it through tears, “Why doesn’t anybody like a girl president?”

Of course, on Wednesday after her defeat, Mrs. Clinton got up, put on her pantsuit, and kept on plugging. She didn’t sulk, or throw a fit, complain, or blame anybody else. She was gracious, humble, and professional. And no doubt she’ll keep fighting. Because that’s what women do.