Sheila Trenholm

We are pleased to announce that our Head Moderator, Sheila Trenholm, will soon return to school full-time to study food safety. Currently she holds a degree in biology with an emphasis on microbiology. Her professional experience includes working in the food science lab of a local university helping to develop new food products, running microbiological tests, and testing food products with pilot plant sized equipment.

Sheila started the Specific Carbohydrate Diet for herself in February of 2001, following a very bad ulcerative colitis flare. She had been in and out of the hospital with persistent symptoms. Told by her doctors that most people with long-term UC usually end up having their colons removed, Sheila and her husband searched the Internet for a less radical solution. The first link that popped up was about SCD. She began the diet first thing the next morning!  A year later and doing amazingly well, Sheila, along with her husband, put their two children on the diet. Within days of starting, their son’s stools lost their smell, and the frequency dropped from five to eight bowel movements a day to only one to three. Even her husband and daughter had surprising results when they went on SCD 100 percent. Her husband lost the 50 pounds he had battled over the years. Their daughter’s occasional but intense constipation also was brought under control.

Sheila originally joined the Elaine’s Children’s List (now the Pecanbread List) to get ideas for school lunches and to have a comfortable place to discuss having her children on SCD. Six months later, she became a moderator. We are indebted to her for her work on the “stages” chart and in verifying legal supplements, writing material for the Pecanbread web site, counseling many people with difficult cases, and patiently and kindly answering questions on the list for many years. Just before we lost Elaine, she designated Sheila as her replacement regarding SCD food advice and decisions. We wish Sheila all the best as she embarks on this new chapter in her life!