First the good news . . .

We had our therapy call with Katie and 'B' last night. It was a pretty good, working call. First the good news - Katie got support from the group for level 4! However she was not able to go to the high level meeting to get voted up there, apparently she just crossed the Category line (total number) about an hour before the meeting. But she is one step closer - maybe next week.
She started talking about all the feelings she had coming up, of not being worthy and suicide etc. As we explored this, she started talking a little about the basketball team.

I'm still confused about this, but apparently she didn't make the regular team, but she didn't get cut either. She is staying on as the manager, and is basically an alternate for other girls who, for whatever reason, don't have their level to play (level 3 for home games, level 4 for away). As we talked about this, it became pretty clear that she was pretty upset about not really making the team. A lot of it tied in to her weight and tying in her self acceptance to being picked on the team.

So something she was just barely mentioning was hiding a significant issue, and we worked on it a bit. I think we made some progress there.

One other interesting point - she did not know that her poem was in the newsletter! That helped to bring things into perspective - where we each have our own strengths and weaknesses, and while she will never be a star athlete (yes, unfortunately she most likely inherited my amazing *cough* athletic prowess (I was the kid in Junior High who was on the third string of the non-tournament team - and never scored a single basket all season in a game)).

What is a bit frustrating for me is that she can't seem to accept her strengths, and seems to always want to focus on her weaknesses. Things like basketball and being a vet (which requires a lot of math and science, the two subjects she struggles the most in), instead of pursuing her creative (i.e. writing) talents. We even had a discussion with A & B about this a while back, and they talked to all the girls about working on the things they are good at, rather than fighting to do the things they don't have natural aptitudes for.