I received this news article by email a few weeks ago. I was actually sitting in the middle of the Mediterranean as I read it. I turned to my mom and said "Oh great, something else to worry about."

Diabetes complications are not news to me. My parents and doctors shielded me for many years thankfully. But when I hit the appropriate age, words like DCCT and kidney transplants became part of the diabetes lingo. Slowly, they infiltrated my diabetes lifestyle. The risks, the fears, it all slowly built up over the years.

Mostly, complications are a form of motivation for me. I do not want to have issues later in life because of poor control now. I want to be healthy and happy as long as possible. Kidney problems, stroke, amputations, eye problems all sit in the back of my mind. Sometimes it feels more like a continual waiting game. When will they strike? When will I reach the point that they are less of a concern?

Complications really don't concern me on a regular basis. There is just that underlying fear and the constant motivation to remain healthy now. I know the actual risk. I don't let the fear consume me, but those risks do scare me. I've seen them with my own eyes and don't want to experience them any closer than in the hospital bed next to me.

So when I received the email saying that diabetics needed to be concerned about cancer risk, I just wanted to punch somebody. Something else to worry about! Something else to watch for signs! Something else to take precautions against!

It really doesn't change my lifestyle. I take precautions against cancer daily...like avoiding excess sun exposure, staying away from excess radiation, and eating antioxidants on a regular basis. So knowing this doesn't make my life that much harder. It just means that it's something else on my list of "concerns." On the list of "maybes."

It's also another reason to keep pushing for better control (one of my main goals this summer) and to stay on top of all my health. It's another reason to keep looking at my future with calculated hope. That risk is the motivation to seek out the best treatments, the cures, and the preventions. Diabetes is enough to deal with; we do not need to add cancer to the list of health issues.