No "right" answer

In college I had one professor in particular that had multiple choice tests that were "choose the best answer" not choose the "right" answer.  I hated those questions.  I would rather have an in class essay, a take home essay, a project, a presentation, a practical, a term paper, anything except the "best" answer, as there would be at least two answers that were correct, but I had to divine which would be best in my professor's opinion.  Unless it was obvious (which most of the time it wasn't), I would write the pro's and con's for each answer.  I would think of how I would weight each pro and con.  Then I would try to think how my professor would weight each pro and con from what she had said in lectures and through my general knowledge of her and how she thought.  It was maddening.  There was little recourse if I picked a correct but not "best" answer.  I was a rare person because I occasionally would win credit or partial credit for my "best" answer because of my pro/con list and weight marks I would make in the margin of my test.  My test books were a mess by the time I was done if you were wondering.

I've found those tests, while annoying, taught me about life (and I guess the subjects they were supposed to, but to be honest, I can't even remember the specific classes that professor taught).  Or maybe more specifically, they taught me how to critically think about a series of possible answers.  My pro/con lists, with notations of which pros and cons were more important than the others.

Obsidian had an appointment this week with his genetics doctor.  His weight has stayed on his curve for weight gain.  According to the measurements, he lost 1cm of height.  We are going with the assumption that he didn't shrink.  When Dr. N and I last talked, there was significantly less information on Obsidian's chromosomal deletion than there is now.  He had a fair size file of the articles that have been written regarding del 15q11.2, including some that are yet to be officially published.  6 months ago, his deletion was not linked to small stature or gross motor delays.  Now, there has been some other cases that there was small stature and/or gross motor delays.  The strongest links are still to more behavior, cognitive, and seizures problems.  There are completely "normal" people that have also been found to have the deletion.  Current thinking on the deletion (to the best of my understanding) is that it leads to a genetic predisposition of a number of problems.  Obsidian either inherited the deletion from Jet or I or it is a de novo deletion.  The researchers are now thinking when it is inherited, the children have similar issues to what the carrier parent has.  So in Obsidian's case, since Jet nor I have any of the signs/diseases associated with it, the working assumption would be that Obsidian would not be at that much more risk for the problems that show up later than the general population.  6 months ago, Dr. N did not see any benefit for having Jet and I to have a chromosomal study done (unless we wanted it for family planning purposes, which we don't).  So Jet and I were happy to not open that can of worms.  However, now, he is recommending we at least consider it if our insurance covers it (which is a whole different issue for a different rant).  If it was just looking for the 15q11.2 deletion it would be one thing (and we could request no other information be given to us).  But we could find out something could indicate future health issues for one of us.  And what real, tangible is not the correct word, benefit would it be to Obsidian?  Yes, he has the deletion.  Yes, we are aware of the problems that might show up in the future.  But no one can predict if they will be problems for him.  He has not had any of the most common issues (being seizure disorder, mental retardation, and delayed speech).  We might not be as concerned, but it will always be there (at least until he is in his late 20's-early 30's as most of the time it shows up before that point).  There is always the chance he would/will develop them even without the deletion (however, he wouldn't be Obsidian if it weren't for the deletion because it is part of him).

So Jet and I need to decided, unanimously on a question (to be tested or not), that does not have any real "right" answer.  Just a "best" answer.  A best at the current time.  A best for the future (as seen from now).   At this point, I'm leaning towards no.  We will wait and see more.  We can always choose yes in the future, but we can't change our mind back to no...