Okay – I’ve been deep-breathing and praying my way through the morning. 3 of my 4 girls have lice…..I haven’t checked the 4th girl yet. I’m guessing I have it too. I’ve been to the store and bought the kits and have treated 1 girl already.
I need words of wisdom: There were some nits (eggs) that I could NOT get off that daughter’s hair…..will treating (the shampoo stuff) again in 7 days take care of those?
How do I do my own hair?? I’ve started a short list of friends I trust that I can ask to do my hair – I’m thinking that since I can’t see my own scalp I shouldn’t do it on my own. Right?
And, just so you know — this is a total derailment of my plans for today — 🙁
On the upside, I can feel God helping me not totally break down and cry or yell at my daughters or be totally stressed out…..but on the inside, I’m pretty creeped out and definitely doing the sentence-prayer-thing with every other thought!!!
It is so gross feeling! We got them at Christmas when family came to visit. Ugh! I have 4 girls too.
Be sure to use the name-brand treatment kits. The Walmart Equate brand does not work. You need to heat-treat all the bedding, stuffed animals, and anything on their beds or that they have been playing with. Get new brushes, combs, hair elastics, etc or be sure to treat them, too. I sprayed our furniture with the house treatment.
At Walmart you can get a shampoo/conditioner called Lice Away (I think – it is in a green bottle – it’s by the RID section) that has essential oils in it. The lice do not like it and so we used it after treatment for a while.
Comb their hair every night and pick out every nit you find from today until you re-wash. I found that very helpful. Be sure to place those on a paper towel and put it in a ziploc baggie to prevent any from hatching and crawling around. Ick.
It will pass, but I have to admit it gets me feeling crawly. 😉
So sorry to hear this! It is awful! My son brought it home a couple of years ago. He then gave it to me. 😉 I cried every day for a week! Agreeing with the pp. The only other advice I have to give is to get one of the Nit Free Terminator combs from Amazon. You can order it and get it next day. It worked great! HTH!
Oh no! 🙁 I had lice as a kid and my poor mom had to pick nits from two girls with super thick and long hair. My BFF just told me this morning her granddaughter who is 3 has lice and her mama is freaking out trying to figure out where she got it. I’ll pass this info onto her, but just wanted to say I remember hearing that blow drying your hair keeps lice from invading because they can’t tolerate the heat. So keep picking nits and use that blow dryer on their hair and yours too. Big hugs mama!
Thank you all for the advice and well-wishes. I’m still a bit depressed, but two girls are done and I’m ready to start on the third head.
I read about using Cetaphil cleanser, so I’m going try that with girls #3 and #4…..and then myself. They say that the cetaphil coats the lice and nits and when you blow dry them, it shrink wraps them and they suffocate and die. I’m going to try to have my 11yo apply it my hair……or maybe I should just do it myself. I can’t decide which would be less stressful and the best job.
I did use the CVS store brand of lice-killer-shampoo on girls #1 and #2. They say their heads are less-itchy, so hopefully it did work. And I guess I’ll just be combing their heads every day for a while.
*L* This really gives new meaning to the word “nit-picking”!! Perhaps God is teaching me to not be so persnickety!!
My sister just went though this and all she used was coconut oil. She coated her daughters hair and put a plastic shower cap and let it sit for a while. It suffocates them and dissolves the nit glue so the nits wash off. She never even combed them out!
My daughter came home from an American Girl club meeting with lice a few years ago. I used a similar approach to Kayla’s sister. I really didn’t want to put poison on her head so I used olive oil. I slathered it on her head and put a shower cap on for a couple of hours. Then I combed out all the lice and nits. After that I kept her hair up in a bun and combed for lice and nits every day until I was positive they were gone.
I couldn’t get anyone with good eyes to do my hair for me so I used the lice shampoo and combed my hair every day for a while. I never found any lice or nits in my hair, thankfully, but I didn’t want to take chances.
I was a preschool teacher for years and I learned more than I ever wanted to know about lice. It became such a problem at one point that I began wearing my hair in a bun every day (not a good look for me!) and I slicked it back with hairspray as well. Lice don’t like hairspray. They like clean hair.
Don’t forget to wash all bedding and vacuum the floors and the furniture. It’s also a good idea to put stuffed animals in a garbage bag for a few days. Honestly, lice won’t live off of a live host for long so the main place to treat is the child’s head but I went the whole 9 yards for good measure!
Oh! Don’t forget to boil all the hairbrushes and combs in the house!
You do not need to do all the treatment you think. We had it last fall, and I learned a ton from The Nice Lice Lady. http://thenicelicelady.blogspot.com
All I used was generic Cetaphil and a good comb followed by hair drying. The chemical stuff doesn’t work on lice any better, plus it stinks! No need to tie up all your bedding and such. Lice can only live on the scalp, and once they are off the scalp for 24 hrs they die.
So sorry you are having to deal with this. I got DH to comb my hair, and when he couldn’t I did it myself best as I could. There is a section on the website about combing your own hair. Although I recommend getting someone else to do it if possible.
Some places have salons solely for getting rid of lice. They are not cheap – they go through each strand of hair individually to get remove all lice and nits – but they are gone in one treatment.
Well, the end of Lice: day 2 has finally come. This morning, first thing, I washed my own hair (I treated it with cetaphil). I found no lice. I combed it enough to keep it put of my way and did three of my girls’ heads.
The chemical shampoo (used on 2 girls) resulted in a couple of dead lice, and bunches of nymphs. Lots of eggs still on the hair shafts.
The Cetaphil (used on 2 girls and myself) resulted in a few dead lice, a couple live lice, and bunches of nymphs. Lots of eggs still on shafts.
My 11yo combed thru my hair for me and she only found 1 louse, a few nymphs, and a few eggs……I’m hoping she was as thorough on my head as I was on hers!
I did discover that each section MUST be combed thru – even if I didn’t see anything, there were plenty of nymphs or eggs that came off in the comb.
So, the plan now is to comb (a la the Nice Lice Lady – thanks so much for that link!) every day at least for a couple days. I know she says you can do every 2-3 days, but the creep-factor won’t let me skip.
And, I just want to give some praise to God – in addition to the 6 or 7 hours I spent on our 5 heads of hair today, I also got 29 chickens cut up, freezer packed, and in the freezer……14 carcasses are in the stockpot to cook overnight and can tomorrow. 12 carcasses are in the fridge to cook off and can tomorrow, too. The remaining carcasses are in the freezer for sometime when I feel like making and canning chicken corn soup.
I’m dead tired, but so thankful that God provided grace and strength for yesterday and today…….and am trusting Him for more tomorrow!
So glad the website was helpful! Keep checking your head. After we found nothing we checked every 3 days until we found nothing for a solid week. Yes, it is a pain and time consuming, but once you find nothing the process goes a lot faster. I think we combed for a month. It sounds like you are making a lot of progress! We found lots more bugs in our hair when we first started. You should be over yours soon hopefully.