Poor DS (16months) started showing signs of hives on Friday morning. We went to the peds office 2 hours later, his ped was unavalible so we saw the alternative nurse practitioner. She right away diagnosed him with hives due to an allergic reaction from something and told me to give him 1.25ml of Benadryl every 6 hours. Well the hives progressively got worst, and he started to get purple streaking on his legs and arms, so me and DH took him to the er Friday night. We proceeded to wait in the er for 5 hours and still were NEVER seen, we ended up leaving because he looked better once, I'm assuming, a dose of benedryl kicked in. Saturday morning he was even worst so we went back to the er, this time, I guess because of how bad DS looked, they rushed us back and gave him an oral steroid and some more benedryl. We were also given a prescription for the steroid to take for 5 days. The steroid seems to help for a while, but then he flares up again. On top of all that the er doctor told me based off DS weight he should be getting 6ml of Benadryl every 6 hours, so I was way under dosing him, and the crap doesn't even help!! It takes 2 HOURS to take effect then only last for 2 hours. Poor DS is trying to scratch his skin off. I've also used calamine and hydrocortisone. I'm just at a loss as what to do, he so miserable and nothin. Seems to make the hives any better. Is this normal? I'm going to be calling the ones in the morning again and I'm going to make sure I can be seen by his regular ped. It's been 3 full days now with no improvement, and now he has diarrhea, probably because of all the Benadryl I keep pumping him full of anybody have any ideas? Things that have worked? Commiseration? This has been a very bad weekend. He's currently taking his 3rd bath of the day because the water seems to keep the scratching at bay.