A painful discovery

Any parent will tell you that it's painful to see their children sick. Particularly when their child is a baby and can't tell you what's wrong. For over a month now Esther has been sick and therefore I've been feeling, well, pained for her. It started with an infection that she got put on antibiotics for (amoxicillin). We thought if had cleared up, but after Christmas we discovered that she had an ear infection in both ears. So she got put on a different antibiotic (augmentin). Then yesterday, after she had been on it for a week, I began noticing some strange behaviors in her.
First I noticed that her mouth was a little swollen and she didn't want her pacifier, which she loves and would have it in her mouth all day long if we would let her. I decided to mention it to Mike when he got home that night.
Then she started doing this:
This would be crawling around on her hands and toes. I thought "maybe it's just a developmental thing that means she's one step closer to walking."
Then when I put her down for a nap I noticed a little bit of redness near her belly button and diaper line. I thought her diaper had just been put on too tight.
When she woke up from her nap she didn't want to be cuddled like she normally does. I couldn't find a holding position that was comfortable for her. She was crying a ton, without me being able to soothe her. So I went to change her diaper, and then I found out what was wrong. She had the hives! Everywhere on her poor little body (except her head) was covered with them! Her joints (knees, elbows, ankles, wrists) were extremely swollen and red.
The flash washed out some of the redness, but she was covered. Notice the redness around her armpits. That meant that picking her up was painful.

This picture is hard to see, but that is one very swollen baby ankle. The flash washed out the redness, but notice how you can't see the definition of the ankle bone? That's why she was crawling around on her hands and toes, she couldn't bend any of her joints!
So we called the doctor and were thankfully able to get an appointment immediately. Unfortunately we had to wait in the doctor's office forever, but what's new? When we finally did get in to see our wonderful pediatrician, Dr. West, she immediately knew what was wrong. In her words "Esther is having one hum-dinger of an allergic reaction to penicillin." Poor baby! Dr. West checked out Esther's ears, but unfortunately the ear infections have not cleared up yet, so she still needs antibiotics. We stopped the augmentin and switched over to azithromycin, which is an antibiotic that does not contain penicillin. Dr. West suggested Benadryl for the hives, but also said that it will probably take another 2 or 3 days before they totally go away. Today the hives are worse than yesterday and are all over her face, neck and head. She's pretty miserable when she's awake, but thankfully the Benadryl is keeping her asleep a lot so her little body can heal itself. Hopefully she can get better soon. I hate seeing her in so much pain! I miss my little angel! Anyways, thanks for your prayers and support and I'll be sure to keep ya'll updated on her progress.