Read Burn Patterns for Free Online Page B

and got three. ‘You mustn’t be upset by this. There’s nothing you could have done. I’m glad you’re out of it. You know that.’
    â€˜Yes,’ she said, wan smile.
    He stood, patted her on the shoulder. She tried to pat his hand but found herself rubbing the shoulder where his hand had been.
    â€˜I’d better be off before it gets too hot. Have a good day.’
    â€˜Yes. You too.’
    Mathew clattered on the tiles in his cycling shoes. She watched him through the French doors, carrying his helmet and backpack around to his racing bike in the garage.
    She should have told him about the school.
    *
    Iris crept into the practice, managing to avoid everyone except Mary. ‘Patricia said you weren’t coming in.’
    â€˜I’m not. I’m not here. Just writing up, Mary.’ Iris put her finger to her lips.
    Mary retrieved a handbag from a desk drawer and held it out to Iris. ‘It came from the hospital.’
    Iris shut herself in her office and got to work on Hannah’s file. They’d made poor headway, although it had only been the second visit. Neither was compliant in the treatment, she noted.Hannah resisted telling. Donna resisted giving up control of Hannah. Then, of course, the police had interrupted everything.
    Until Iris could convince Hannah to talk about her life with ‘the problem’ she could not naturally externalise the problem in order to ‘beat it’. Iris could see patterns, which wasn’t the point. Hannah needed to see the patterns, want better ones she could believe in. An early step was to identify how not eating was a negative. Iris would explore the metaphors she’d read concerning useful approaches to anorexia. It erodes parts of life. It eats away friends and joyful experiences. Anorexia likes to divide families. It likes to isolate. Ed was a bad guy.
    On the other hand, Hannah’s eating disorder might not be ‘the problem’. It might be the result of another problem. At first, Iris thought Hannah was trying to punish her mother, making her dance to Hannah’s sickness, triumphing over the over-control or demanding attention from a busy working parent. However, Iris detected an enabler in Donna. Both, perhaps. The two had developed a loop. Hannah might be trying to please her mother. Donna’s internal story: Look what I do for you. Hannah: Yes, mummy. Look how I need you. Look how I’m a child. Donna: Naughty, good girl. Be my child.
    Further exploration of attachment theory might be useful. Insecurity of both. Hannah had physical health issues as well as her mental causes. Donna had fears for her child and of losing her child. Iris could help these two women. She was sure of it.
    If they’d let her. If they came back. They may well decide that the storytelling was not for them. Iris still had trouble trying to sell it to people, even though she thought it could work for Hannah and Donna. Iris had lost patients already since stepping in for Dr Chew. She’d gained some too, especially those seeking help with post-traumatic stress disorder, police and firefighters loyally following her from her previous life to get counselling that had nothing to do with narrative therapy. Perhaps everything was to do with everything.
    Next, Iris wrote notes regarding a client who was a retired athlete. He’d lost physical shape, developed a problem with prescription drugs, ones he’d used in competition to help him sleep before big games. He’d become addicted to the drugs,using them now to numb depression as he failed to cope with no longer being famous. In fact they were feeding his depression. Iris had recommended a discreet drug-treatment centre not offered by the practice, and was also working up ideas in which to enter into re-authoring conversations. Iris was confident he could be nudged back on track with his new life, if they could discover what direction he wanted to embark on.
    When