LO started having health problems at 10 months and is almost 3 years now. We have seen a million emergency room doctors, a thousand inpatient doctors, and I just switched our pediatrician in hopes of if not figuring things out, then at least not being treated like an idiot for being worried about my daughter. We have seen an ENT and a pulmonologist, with no breakthroughs.
LO was born at 37 weeks, induced due to my HELLP syndrome. Underweight but otherwise normal until 10 months. At 10 months, she started having croup attacks severe enough that we had to go to the hospital for dexamethasone, epinephrine and oxygen. Eventually got a home prescription of dexamethasone. She began getting sick with every little bug. When she got sick, it always went as badly as possible- a cold could lead to Bronchiolitis, RSV is a definite hospitalization for us, and she rarely has a fever that is below 104 w/ out meds. This went on until January, when on top of everything else, she started having post viral hives after her illnesses. And now the hives are bruising.
The croup occurs at the unset of any illness- a cold, strep, whatever. It is usually the first sign. Hives occur when the illness has run its course.
So, for example, on Thursday she goes to bed normal, croup attack in the night, treated w/ dexamethasone at home, if not successful, off to emergency room. On Friday she will develop symptoms of whatever illness she actually has and croup will not re-occur during this illness. On the last day or so of her illness, she will break out into severe hives- whole body, including eyes, ears, and mouth. These will last about three days. This month, Benadryl stopped working, so she takes Claritin and Benadryl during an outbreak.
2 weeks ago, her hives left her with full body bruising. Went to dr. and they basically said unusual, but not unheard of. Sigh.
To me, it sounds like an over reactive immune response, but she was tested and nothing came up- however, I recently spoke to a mama whose kiddo was tested for immune system disorders and she went on and on about how much blood they took and they did not take much for LO, so I am wondering if we had a comprehensive test battery or not.
Anyway, does anyone have any insight? I haven’t met anyone IRL who has ever heard of this particular combo of symptoms.