Miss Montana speaks of development disorder

HELENA (AP) — For much of her first 11 years, Alexis Wineman was bullied and teased, staying quiet to hide her speech problems, descending into self-loathing, looking at herself as a punching bag, scratching her arms and even banging her head against walls.

After one bout of frustration in school, a teacher told her she wasn't getting paid enough to deal with her kind of behavior.

"I felt so alone growing up, and I still do at times," Wineman, now Miss Montana 2012, told a group of more than 300 people Friday at a conference on autism and Asperger's syndrome, put on by the Helena-based ChildWi...