Tu-be or not Tu-be

Tu-be or not tu-be, that is the question.  Okay, that is an awful play on words but I could not resist.  The issue that I am referring to will become clear momentarily.

First, a quick update about my return to work.  The lack of updates should not be taken to mean that I was swallowed up by my employment-parenting responsibilities with no way to contact the outside world.  Any of my friends in Facebook know that I'm still somewhat active there.  Actually my lack of blog updates means that enough time has passed since my return to work that I have already worked 1/3 of the days remaining until summer vacation.  Not that I am having an awful time of it or anything.  I am actually enjoying the "break" from the house and the opportunity to be making connections with friends, colleagues and clients again.  The routine of it has been an adjustment, for sure, as there are many things that need to be organized on the nights before work and the mornings before I leave.  Pumping is a bit of a pain.  And I'm darn tired most nights afterward, but, really, I was tired most nights before I went back to work.  That's the reality of life with an infant and a toddler.

So, about the aforementioned tubes ... I'm referring to the ear tubes that the ENT has suggested for Bug after he turns 6 months.  He just turned 5 months, by the way.  Yet another dilemma has presented itself to us in regards to this guy's health.  Here's what we know:

- he continues to have fluid in his ears, although the levels seem to vary
- he shows more and more signs of hearing and making sounds, while there are still signs that he is missing some sounds
 - he has had no sign of ear infections (yet)
- tubes are usually done after multiple ear infections/chronic fluid, though I haven't seen much about tubes in babies as young as Bug
- kids who get tubes later (18 months or later) seem to catch up with their language despite having had chronic fluid/infections
- we really don't know if his hearing loss is due to fluid or if it is a real loss requiring some intervention, in which case time is of the essence
- excess fluid/mucous may or may not be related to food sensitivities, depending on which doctor we're talking to
- this food sensitivity thing remains a mystery to us, but Bug is growing well, happy and sleeping well, so we're just going to continue as we are (breastfeeding with me removing the major allergens, slowly adding foods back if symptoms don't worsen - even if there isn't a lot of improvement)
*** As a side note, we saw the allergist today and Bug tested negative on a skin test for milk & milk proteins, soy, wheat, peanuts, nuts, egg white, cat, dog, and dust mite allergies. 

This is surgery that we are talking about here, with general anesthetic for a 6 month old.  Is it necessary?  Will it be worth the risk for the potential outcome?  Are answers about his hearing essential at this very stage in his life or can we wait this out for awhile?  That is what we are trying to figure out.  As with many of these types of decisions, I flip back and forth on this one.  Writing this out helps, though.  Talking to other parents who have decided to either have tubes put in or wait also helps.  Our next steps are to, hopefully, do a phone consult with the audiologist and then we will talk to the pediatrician on our next visit and see what she recommends.

ETA:  I have consulted with several speech and language pathologists, a hard-of-hearing classroom teacher, a special ed teacher, and multiple parents having had somewhat similar experiences (though their kids mostly had persistent/frequent ear infections).  So I'm definitely doing my homework on this!