dizziness, increased or slowed heart rate,
low blood pressure, excessive fatigue,
dehydration, nausea and weakness, among
others. Many children with this condition
are unable to participate in organized
activities or attend school full-time.
Piekut, 19, first began experiencing
symptoms when she was running track in
middle school.
“The more I exercised, the worse I felt,”
she explains. “My body was getting weaker,
and it got to the point where I couldn’t
function.”
Because its symptoms are often associated with other disorders,
one or both of these conditions are often misdiagnosed, leading to
a delay in treatment. Before the final diagnosis was found, Piekut
was sent to physical rehabilitation, which only exacerbated her
symptoms.
“One of the symptoms of POTS is exercise intolerance, because
you can get dehydrated so quickly,” she says. “I was getting worse
instead of better.”
Too weak to attend classes, she required homebound schooling
while doctors worked to find a diagnosis. For Piekut, who had
always been an active child, the conditions could have been
devastating. Instead, she focused her
efforts on treatment, overcoming
her symptoms and working within
her limits. Since she could no longer e Tafe
participate in organized team sports,
Piekut turned her attention to the
stage.
“My parents say I’ve been a
performer since birth. When I was
little, they even bought me a pretend
stage with drawstring curtains,” she
says.
A piano player since childhood, she also performed in musicals
and with her church youth group. Her teachers encouraged her to
try opera, but she was not interested—at first.
“When I would sing for my teachers, they would always tell me
that I had a classical voice, and that it was a natural fit for opera,”
she says. “But I didn’t care for opera at all. I had zero interest in it.”
Still, she took the advice of her teachers and began studying
the genre at Duquesne University’s City Music Center, which she
attended for three years during high school.
“Once I began studying opera, I realized how beautiful it was
and how easily it came to my voice,” she explains.
It was that newfound love for a classic art form that led to her
to enter the beauty pageantry circuit, primarily as a way to gain
experience singing for a live audience on stage.
Unlike many of her competitors, who can spend years practicing
for and competing in a multitude of pageants, Piekut didn’t enter
her first competition, National American Miss Pennsylvania, until
2012, when she was 16. She placed first runner-up out of 115 girls
who were competing for the Junior Teen title.
“To be named first runner-up in my first
pageant ever—I thought, ‘I might be good at
this,’” she says with a laugh.
Two years after that pageant, she won the
National American Miss Pennsylvania Teen title
in the 16 to 18-year-old division. At the National
American Miss Teen pageant in 2014, she was
named first runner-up in the country and fourth
runner-up in talent.
In December, Piekut, who also works as a
professional model, was awarded the title of
2015 International Junior Miss Pennsylvania
Teen. She went on to win the 2015 International
Junior Miss International Teen title, as well as the International
Teen Talent title for singing an aria called “Nessun Dorma,”
competing against girls from all 50 states and from countries
around the world.
“It was completely surreal. Just six months before, I had heard
my name called first as the first runner-up. This time, when my
name wasn’t called first, and I knew I had won, I couldn’t stop
crying,” she says. “I remember turning and trying to find my family.
I didn’t know where to look.”
The win didn’t become real to her until days later, she says.
“It’s a new reality. This past year has been an absolute whirlwind,”
she states.
As part of her pageant duties, she’s
made appearances at New York Fashion
Week and traveled to London and Paris
with other pageant winners. She was
invited to sing the national anthem at
various events, including the Norwin
Junior ROTC Bataan Memorial March.
She’s even had a pair of shoes named
after her by New York shoe designer