Sounds like things might be resolving now hun (i'm late again! LOL) but my thoughts:

Teething. Seriously DD goes through this sometimes and NOTHING was different. The most frustrating thing was that nothing every changed either (like no teeth appeared to let me know it'd been teething all along) but then after a particularly bad 3 weeks of it a molar appeared and i was like "oh riiiiiiiiight!" and we haven't looked back. It can be frustrating as DD only got her first molars at 23 months, and now she's getting her 2 year molars so we have about 2 weeks of every 6 where she isn't sleeping. I just try to really enjoy the month in between I get the impression that it's lying down, which puts pressure on the back of the head and changes the pressures inside the sinuses makes the jaws ache more where the teeth are coming up. Which is how come the moany moany moaning when they lie down. DD used to mess about and get in and out of bed and fall asleep sat up and all sorts! LOL. I think when the first teeth come through the gums hurt but when it's the back teeth they can get jaw ache, ear ache, sore throat, you name it. And FWIW i don't find painkillers work very well for tooth pain on ME, so maybe bubs have the same trouble?

Re the hitting - i re-direct DD. "Don't hit Mama, that hurts! Hit the cushion/sofa/whatever." I don't know what you do but i found this really helped her in the gap between being feeling the strong emotions and being able to verbalise her feelings. Like if she wasn't allowed to hit she had no way to express her emotions, but i didn't want her to think hitting people or animals was ok. My DP was always told not to hit/shout etc. (stopped rather than redirected) and he BOTTLES his feelings to this day!

Bx