Our First ER Visit...

Well, we had quite an adventure on Saturday. It all started on Thursday. I noticed that Jenna had 5 little pin head sized red bumps on her leg. I didn't think much of it and figured it was probably a mild reaction to the vaccine or bandaid. On Friday I noticed larger bumps all over her legs and arms, some of them looked blistery. The best way I can describe it was that it looked like Chicken Pox. She didn't seem to be bothered by it, but I called the doctor and he wanted her to come in. So, we went in and he took a look. He said that it did not look like a typical reaction to vaccinations, but that it was possible. He thought it would be more likely to be a reaction to the Tylenol I'd given her after getting the shots. He prescribed Benedryl and said to stop Tylenol (we'd already stopped it). So, I gave her Benedryl that evening and by the next morning the hives were gone. But, by 1pm they returned, so I gave her more Benedryl. About 15 minutes later they were getting worse and I noticed that her ears were swelling, especially the left one. It looked huge. I tried calling the doctor, but after waiting a little while, I got worried and we headed to the Urgent Care center nearby. We walked in and asked if we should go to the ER and the guy working at the front desk told us that he just worked at the front desk and he'd need us to fill out some papers and insurance info and that he'd ask the doctor when he came out. Well, since he wouldn't give us any sort of indication when that would be, we decided to go to the Emergency Room. I took the picture below of her ear while we were waiting at the ER (it is a little blurry). It was getting smaller and I wanted to show the doctor what it had looked like in case it looked normal by the time he got there. The doctor showed up shortly after I took the picture, so he got to see it. He checked her airway and said the hives were not there, so she was fine and gave us guidance for what to watch for if they moved to her airway. He gave her some medication and told us to keep giving her Benedryl. He suspected that the reaction was due to either her formula, Tylenol, or the vaccines and he recommended that we stop the formula for a few days and reintroduce it independently of the Tylenol (we will try reintroducing it as well). Luckily, she never seemed bothered by the hives and so far we haven't seen them return yet. I'll keep you updated when we try reintroducing the formula and Tylenol.