THE PENNY DROPPED - A tale of Women's Freemasonry and the Barefoot Doctor

I came across some female masons back in the 90s and naively I accepted an invitation to give them a talk about Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). They called themselves The Breakfast Club when they made the booking and I understood from the first conversation that they were a Christian group attached to a small local church.

I gave my talk to a circle of grim faced women who persistently sat in absolute silence with their arms crossed.
That evening I was feeling very well and strong.
I was able to give my talk flawlessly without interruption and it centred around the basics of Yin, Yang and Chi progressing onto simple diagnostics.
When I reached the end I asked them if they had any questions and was delighted when one of them asked me what I thought of Jesus. They listened carefully to my answers and they persisted on this theme, closely questioning the relationship I perceived between Christianity and Taoism.

I explained that every one of the miracles Jesus is credited with can be performed with TCM and I gave examples. I explained that the parables Jesus is reputed to have used have their origins in teaching tools within Taoism. I told them that when he fed the multitude with loaves and fishes it was symbolic because it is with bread and fish that children learn the differences between yin and yang in China.
I enthused about the 'EUREKA' moment that I experienced when I first read the ancient formula of Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh and when I learned about Soma, the formula that can cause a patient to appear dead for 3 days so that an essential operation or healing can be performed.
There was such a deathly silence that I stopped there.

They started to put their chairs away and the most elderly among them offered me a cup of tea and a piece of cake which she had prepared.
She engaged me in a polite conversation and by the time I had consumed the offering every one of the women had vanished. Not one of them stayed for tea and the elderly lady had not made anything for herself either.
The oddness of this event perturbed me. My talks usually ended with much more enthusiasm than that. I would usually hand out my business cards or actually book consultancy appointments at these events.
I arrived home around 10pm and went to bed early.
At 4am I was projectile vomiting and writhing in agony.
I had been poisoned.

I was beyond ill. I was dying. I became unconscious and only regained consciousness with a shocking jerk when I realised that I was going. I took my pulse and my wrist was cold, clammy and skeletal to the touch.
I could not see at all.
In traditional Chinese Medicine there is a pulse, described in the text books as "spirit pulse". It is almost flatlining and when I felt it I knew that I did not have long to fix myself.
I dragged my pained body down the stairs and crawled to my consulting room. I grabbed the gold, frankincense and myrrh and for the first time in my practice I made a medicine without measuring the doses. I could not see to do that.
I threw the ingredients into my mortar and pestle and pounded them to dust. I transferred the mixture to my glass pan and boiled it as fast as I could on full heat, another first for me. I was usually so meticulous about weights and measures and time spent lovingly creating these wonderful formulas but this was an emergency and my priority was to cheat death.

It took me a full year to recover from that poisoning and in that time I lost a lot of weight, my business and my friends.
I lost my husband to another woman and he even took my vehicle and my dog.
I was literally stripped of everything I held dear.
I was alone.

A chance encounter with my professor of Chinese medicine led us to some tests with the purpose of discovering precisely what had poisoned me. With the help of friends we found that it had been phosphorus and my intestines were so scarred that I could no longer tolerate gluten bearing grains.
As soon as I understood this my health started to improve dramatically.

Another chance encounter helped me to piece together this story.
I met the woman who had booked the Breakfast Club talk. She was in the first aisle of my local supermarket.
She paled significantly when she recognised me, dropped her basket and ran out of the shop.
Later, again completely by chance, I saw her carrying trays of linen draped food into the local Freemason's Lodge.
The penny dropped.

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