So, we’re back to lice again. I’ve been putting off writing this one for a while. What’s it been? Two months? Three?
No, four months.
Four months of on-and-off hell. I will get rid of them for a few weeks and then they’re back again. Twice I took Keira in to the hairdressers to get her hair cut short as a possible deterrent and twice was turned away. You wouldn’t believe it; I certainly didn’t. I sat her down at home prior to each visit and combed it through thoroughly to check. All clear. Then the moment she sits in the chair and the hairdresser takes a quick look, she backs away, holding up the comb surrender-style and says, “I can’t. She’s still infested.”
Such a wonderful adjective, and she hissed it with all the emphasis on the second syllable’s harsh ’s’ that it deserved. The other patrons turned around to stare at us, which is hard to do when you’re underneath one of those conehead hair dryers. I grabbed our coats and left, leaving her with the best rebuke I could summon:
“I wouldn’t have brought her if I’d known.”
That last time I was so shamed, I came home and cried. I decided a trip to the Doctor was necessary. After all, don’t the treatment bottles all say, “If lice continue after prescribed dosage, please seek professional help.”
Well, I had reached that point. I’d done all I could do, hadn’t I?
My Doctor didn’t see it that way.
“How many people actually get this far along that they seek help?” I asked the Doctor as jovially as I could.
“Not many,” he replied bluntly. Not as many mothers are as slack-assed as you in getting rid of them, I read between the lines of his tone.
Still, he did write a prescription for a certain kind of antibiotic which has the lovely side effect of being toxic to lice if they feed off the bloodstream the drug is in.
It worked, but the victory was hollow. Every spec of dust around the house still got the once-over. Every time Keira raised her hand to her head I would hold my breath. It was exhausting.
We were able to get that haircut, eventually. In the car on the way there, Keira said loudly. “Do I have nits now?”
“No. No. No” I said. “And - uh - let’s not mention that word to our” (very new and in a different mall entirely!) “hairdresser.”
This brings up to last week.
When I found them again.
There is a line in Hamlet which states, “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”
I’ve been saying that a lot.
It helps.
In between the cursing.
******
*That great word comes courtesy of another blogger who has battled this recently and I just had to quote her. But I didn’t link to her, because, well, I don’t want to ‘out’ her either. If she’s reading, she knows who she is 
9:52 am
A spin on the nasties!!!
Because both my niece and one of my friends kids in particular have continuous nit problems. The few times Libby has got them she’s decided its a right of passage to being a big girl.
Telling everyone that she has them, even if she doesn’t. With the biggest smile on her face. Asking her teachers to check her hair, because she is SURE that she has them.
I am wondering when the reality of their reputation will kick in with her because at the moment, I just giggle privately at her.
Its easier said than done but chill - my sister is an absolute nit freak and she basically tents her house and fumigate’s. T still gets them each week, her hair is like a magnet!
10:24 am
Okay…I can help…I went through this several times with my daughter, and her hair is like 5 times thicker than mine…and we used the same brush and I never got it…and we tried all kinds of stuff from the drug store and off the internet…the doctor perscription meds…etc…
so i said…why? why didn’t I get it? the answer seems to be WASHING your hair daily, BLOW DRYING your hair DAILY with a HOT blow dryer, and using HAIRSPRAY. A hair straightener would probably be good too!
Forget all the other stuff…do this…good luck! Let me know!
~Laura
Laura
lauralovesart’s last blog post..Family Changes
11:36 am
Hugs karen.
it’s an awful feeling when you can’t get rid of the little suckers. You feel all… dirty, weird. Anyhow. My middle girl, Lily was prone to them. I couldn’t get rid of them for ages but (touch wood) she hasn’t had them for almost six months.
They tell me as the hair changes with age, the lice lose interest.
tiff’s last blog post..When you’re down to the wire.
11:44 am
I know it’s exhausting, but you will get there. You will. Just continue to segment her hair with little hair ties each time you’ve pull eggs out of a situation, use the banlice mousse and the num-num comb. Also maybe if you alternate which bed she sleeps in with her bed and the trundle- I read somewhere once that they die after 24 hours without a host and so if she doesn’t sleep in her bed each night maybe that will help…
12:18 pm
One of my sons had them, fortunately only once. That was it. We are so lucky as he also had relatively short hair, and the older one who had a thick, longish mop, never got them.
Infested is such a harsh word!
Suze’s last blog post..A Lost Teenage Spirit
12:27 pm
Oh dear. We’ve just had our first encounter. No idea yet how long it’s going to go.
I bought one of those Robi combs with the intention of running it through DD’s hair every day just to be sure. We’ll see how that goes (I only discovered them Tuesday).
DD told everyone at school on Wednesday that she had had them. It seems these days that “everyone gets them” so the stigma (well at her age) doesn’t seem to be a problem.
I’m keeping my fingers crossed we don’t have the same trouble everyone else seems to have with them.
The chemist was telling me that they LOVE clean, blonde hair.
Lightening’s last blog post..Pink is Not JUST a Colour
1:09 pm
hugs.
It sucks. I know.
My young fella doesn’t seem to get them hardly ever, but my girls……… *shakes head* and hair colour doesn’t seem to make no difference. One is blonde and one is dark.
We started just treating every week. On the same day that we treat hair we wash bedding. We don’t wash hair as often because they apparently prefer clean hair.
My hairdresser told me that you need to treat them every week for a month to break the breeding cycle. It seems to help. Of course doing all the right things doesn’t make any difference at all if someone else at their school isn’t doing all the right things either. I KNOW our source of reinfection is a friend from school.
And now I’m scratching just thinking about it *shudders*
Bettina’s last blog post..More please?
6:34 pm
Oh Karen I feel your pain. My daughter had long, thick, curly hair that seemed to be a magnet. I once had a friend stay at my home for a few days and casually remark that she was treating her daughter with some natural herbal thing for nits. I nearly went psycho! I wanted to eject her from my house on the spot. It was always just such a trauma for all of us. She would be in tears having her hair treated and it was a huge workload to ‘delouse’ the house and everyone it it.
Joh’s last blog post..Swollen
12:30 am
Bless your heart, I know you’re sick to death of this. Hopefully it will be over soon. We haven’t got it yet, but our contact with other kids is still pretty minimal.
Janet’s last blog post..You Got to Make the Morning Last
5:45 am
Perhaps there needs to be a seatbelt in the hairdressers?
Jean-Luc Picard’s last blog post..Ro Laren’s Boyfriend (Part Two)
8:34 am
Thanks everyone. I think the end may be in sight.
(BTW- Shelly, that pink spray we bought? Total shite. Did nothing but colour EVERYTHING)
8:52 am
Oh Karin, I really feel for you! I lived that also. I even bought the bloddy Robi-comb - can I assure you that it doesn’t work so good, especially after it has landed on the floor once or twice and the darned thing is shapped so that it will do so!!
Weekly checks and combs with full house cleaning coinciding did help, eventually.
jeanie’s last blog post..Things I have been Memeing to Tell You…
4:30 pm
Waiiiitttt just a stinkin’ minute!!!
Just what is this miracle antibiotic? I’ve never heard of this. I must have missed the lecture about it in medical school and yeah and the one in pediatric residency too! But still in the last 8 years I’ve never run across it.
Maybe this doc need to have a stern talk with me as well. I’m just another slack-assed mommy/pediatrician who thinks you did a great job trying to get rid of it!
DrCason’s last blog post..Is Your Fear an Indulgence?
4:39 pm
LOL - I should’ve included that Doc, shouldn’t I?
It’s Septrin (another name for co-trimoxazole as Google has just informed me)
5:52 am
Thanks!
I’m so happy I got to blog and learn something extremely useful for my patients. I did more research. And he was right! Even though it’s not FDA approved for use as a pediculide it has been shown to be very effective for resistant cases. !!! Yeah- thanks for the tip.
DrCason’s last blog post..Is Your Fear an Indulgence?
3:33 am
Oh, I remember this…my two sisters and I used to pass it back and forth to each other. Piles of laundry, itchy heads, stuffed animals in quarantine…I feel your pain!
Sarah’s last blog post..Fireflies? Sweet!