Lukin can you hear me?

I had a hard time falling asleep last night because I was just laying in bed thinking about Lukin's hearing. I don't know if I mentioned the fact that my mom was worried when he was staying with her about his hearing in one of his ears. He didn't say a sound when the phone was put up to that ear and he yammered on when the phone was by his other ear. So I have been worrying about it off and on for a few days now. I did a little online research yesterday because I wanted to know what else I should be looking at.

Surprise. Surprise. If he has hearing difficulty, he may have trouble with speech-language development. Now, I already knew that. But I just never really thought about Lukin and that situation before. It made me sick to my stomach. I thought about what I can handle as a parent and decided that from where I sit now in life, I could handle many things but not a hearing loss, not speech and language delays.

I think it's hard because when he is the firstborn, I don't have anything to gauge him against. My husband doesn't seem to get it but even though I am a SLP, I don't work with the birth to 3 population, so I don't know about their own set of qualification standards. I don't know how to gauge whether or not there is anything to even worry about.

My husband says, "He'll grow out of it." "Not everyone develops at the same rate." "We'll ask the doctor in March." None of those responses make me feel any better. I want answers now. Maybe it's true that one day he will just start talking. Maybe it's true that boys just develop slower and it will come. But I don't want to gamble on 'maybes' with my child's development.

So, that's what is going on in my head.