Swollen Face - Please Advise!

The dose for Benedryl is 1-2 mg/lb body weight given two-four times a day.
 
Use the TWO mg dose.  The over the counter capsules are 25 mg.  So a 100 pound dog needs four for a minimum dose, or EIGHT for something bad like where you are tonight.
 
So give TWO mg/lb every six hours for the next 24 hours.
 
A bite, or even just coming in contact with an allergen can cause this.  The face is dangerous tho because the dog can go into respiratory arrest easily.
 
Make sure it's just Benedryl -- no "severe cold formula" or anything else -- just the pink capsule/caplet.

Thanks. All I had was the liquid. While I was waiting for a reply, I  browsed a bit more online. I found  a site that said to give 50 mg for dogs over 50 lbs. So, I mixed 4 tsp (50 mgs) with some plain yogurt (she loves that) and she gobbled it up. So, shall I wake her to give her more later or let her sleep for the night?

The same thing happened to my dog a few years ago. We were visitng family away from home at the time, so we rushed her to a local vet. They gave her a fairly high dose of Benadryl and said we could give her more when we got home (which would have been about 5-6 hours later) if the swelling hadn't gone down. By about halfway home the swelling was completely gone, though, so we just gave her a small dose at home as a safety measure that night.

So based on our experience, I'd say if the swelling is gone, you don't need to worry about waking her to give her more. If her face is still swollen, I'd definitely wake her for another dose.

What do you think it was? A spider bite or something? The funny thing is...she sleeps in her crate covered like a birdcage. We had to start this when she was a young pup. It was the only way she would go to sleep. So, I cannot see her unless I uncover it, which will wake her. Hmmm...what to do?

We never found out what caused our dog's face to swell. The only thing we knew for sure is that whatever it was, happened while she was outside. Neither we nor the vet could find any indication of a sting or bite on her, so the vet suggested she might have eaten a bee (but did say any kind of bite or sting could do it). I have actually seen my dog attempt to eat bees before, so it's a likely scenario.

Chances are that she's probably fine after one dose of Benadryl, but if it were me, I'd risk waking her and take a peek just to be sure. The Benadryl may have knocked her out pretty good, so maybe she won't even wake up when you look

My older golden was stung on tahe lip by a ground wasp a few years back.  The picture I am going to show was taken AFTER the trip to the vet and the swelling had started to go down.  And if works a picture of him taken a couple of months.  You can compare the pics and tell how much swelling he had even AFTER it had started going down.

For some reason it didn't show, so here goes again

And his normal face.

I'm going through this with one of my Great Danes as we speak..  I can't give her benadryl as she is a nursing mom.  My vet just said to watch and make sure that  she doesn't have any breathing or throat problems.

Gee, I hope the swelling goes down real soon.  It is scarey to see their faces and heads swollen.  I have to add that just about 8 months before the ground wasp stung him on the lips, he was hit in the face by a rattlesnake in our back yard.  As best we could tell, on the first strike the snake only grazed his lip and shot most of it's venom into the air.  On the next strike, one fang almost got him in his right eye, the other on down between 1 and 1 1/4 inches.  But  very little venom was deposited, thank goodness.  I got him right into the vet and the vet said judging from the size of the holes and the distance between them, the snake had to be at least 6 feet long..  this happened at night about 7:30 or 8:00 in Nov.  Anway, the next day I turned the yard upseide down and found no snake, but a couple of weeks later our neighbors were removing a wooden shed that had blown down near our fence and their dog was hit in the chest by a rattlesnake, probably the same one that got Buck.
 
But the thing is, between the snake bite and the wasp sting, his muzzle never did go back to proper shape.  It is thicker, has a little hump and his nose actaully peeled and was never black again.

I googled and found this topic (sorry that it is such an old one!). I have the same swollen face problem with my dog. It really scares me because about 4 years ago we had a whippet cross and her face got swollen and we ended up having to put her down. It got so bad she couldnt eat anymore. My other dog (a lab cross) woke up to a fat face this morning. He also has the shakes. I am quite worried about him, knowing the outcome of our other dog. I am taking him to the vet in about an hour but I wanted to see what others had to say about what they tried with their dogs so I can tell my vet.