I had one of those moments today that reminded me what I enjoy most being a writer: It gives me access to things I would otherwise never experience. Today I got to sit in a room filled with diabetes experts--nurses, doctors, dietitians--you know, people with lots of letters after their names. I had no business being a part of their group, but as a writer who tends to focus on diabetes, I was invited in.

The seminar was on gestational diabetes and the treatment of pregnancy complicated by pre-existing diabetes. To many people, this may not sound very exciting, but to me, it was better than going to a rock concert (and don't get me wrong, I love music!).

It was better than meeting celebrities or politicians, both of which I got to do while working in newspapers. I got to meet "celebrities" in the world of diabetes care, like Alyce Thomas, RD, who wrote the book on gestational diabetes, and Lois Jovanovic, MD, an endocrinologist who is the leading expert on diabetes and pregnancy, as well as many local diabetes educators and practitioners. As a health writer, it was an absolute gold mine of contacts.

Having previously read everything I could get my hands on about pregnancy and diabetes, I went into the seminar with a good sense of what was going on. I must say I'm pretty proud of myself that I was able to at least follow along in the conversation.

I learned a great deal more today, some a little more than I wanted to know. I'm just glad I learned it after pregnancy and not during. Pictures of babies with complications from uncontrolled diabetes during pregnancy just broke my heart and I'm extremely grateful my boy was healthy.

Here are a few interesting tidbits I picked up today:

One: 8 percent of all pregnant women today have diabetes.

Two: There is currently not a standard guideline of care for managing glucose in pregnancy. Dr. Jovanovic refered to it as "chaos." The Hyperglycemia and Adverse Pregnancy Outcome (HAPO) study is presently under way and should help to set care standards.

Three: Left untreated, there is a 40 percent chance the baby will develop macrosomia, which not only causes problems at birth, sets the child up to develop type 2 diabetes later in life.

Four: As maternal blood sugar goes up, rates of macrosomia increases--and just one high blood sugar a day increases the risk.

It is a wonder my little boy was so little! Just 5 pounds, 14 ounces at birth. My a1c was great, but it was really hard to keep my blood sugar under 120 at two hours and I know I had days where I had at least daily spike to 180.

Perhaps the coolest thing I found out today was why Danny escaped the big baby syndrome: The fidget factor. Apparently researchers have found the more active the baby is in utero, the smaller their birth weight. That explains a thing or two. In utero, he kicked non-stop and once he was born, he hasn't stopped. He's even wiggling in his sleep.

One last thing I learned today was the story of Elizabeth Hughes. One of the first people ever to be treated with insulin, she's also the first diabetic woman to successfully have children. I'm hoping to find out more about her, because she's my new diabetes hero, the original DM.