Miss Montana, Alexis Wineman, blogs for Autism Speaks about being diagnosed with autism at age 11 and finding success in high school:

Autistic? Great, another name for people to call me other than retarded. Whatever this autism thing was, it ruined my life before I had a chance to live it. But to my surprise things started to get better in high school. People started to back off and through programs like speech & drama and cross country I was able to make some great friends. Graduation became possible and I finished high school with high grades. When I told my parents that I wanted to compete in the Miss Montana program it was a complete shock to them. I grew up hating anything that resembled a pageant. I remember how I would watch the Miss America program when I was younger and seeing those beautiful, intelligent women who, no matter the outcome, had a great future ahead of them. I thought that I could never have a future worth looking forward to and I thought that the confidence and grace these women had was too out of my reach. Looking back, I realize how foolish I was. I have already done so many things I never thought I could do. I’ve run three miles without stopping, spoken in front of many people, qualified for the National Honor Society, and was able to graduate high school with an acceptance to college.