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The WORST was my little girl, long, waist length hair, CURLY! It took hours every night, to comb her hair. Thick, amazing, beautiful hair...I used a lice comb, and gallons of conditioner. Hours, of combing her hair. And she was not happy. I gave her a choice, combing hair or shaving it down. She agreed to the combing. I put Tea Tree Oil in her hair, wrapped her head in a turban, she washed her hair out each morning, with the Tea Tree Oil shampoo.
Nothing like lice to bond a family...my kids really rallied on cleaning their rooms, the house, the car. Hours...every night.
As for the RID intolerance, you can use hair dye too. I dyed my kids hair, and my own, with colors similar to ours. I basically did every treatment I found on the Internet. Except the napalm treatment. I skipped that one.
Last edited by jasper12; 10-22-2013 at 09:47 PM..
Reason: Edit.
We've done both. I hate combing for lice/eggs since we all have thick hair. Last time we went to a place that treated and combed us out, this included a followup visit and guarantee.
It was about $300.00 for three people, but well worth it. The RID shampoo alone would cost that for two treatments. Plus they gave us fantastic cleaning advice. I had always gone crazy in the past, but they re-educated me on what was really need and cut the work in half.
I would also suggest in getting the lice combs they use which are metal (from amazon). They are the best and are great for occasional lice checks.
One of my kids had it in kindergarten. Her sister has oily hair and has never gotten them...I told her the lice probably slide right off.
I think it's a lot easier to comb out a boy's hair than a girl's hair...worst case scenario, you can buy some cheap clippers and shave it down. You need to wash jackets, sheets, blankets, replace pillows, etc. all on the same day to really get rid of the lice.
Hair dye doesn't kill the nits, so even if it gets rid of the lice, the problem will be back in a week or so.
When my kids still went to regular public school, they didn't want you to keep them home for lice anymore...they also wanted us to send them to school even when they were sick so they could be counted for attendence, even if they had to go home right afterwards. The nurse said that as long as you were using lice shampoo, it was fine to send them to school. I was surprised by that, I remember kids getting sent home for lice when I was in elementary school.
I grew up spending summers in the Philippines were lice are more common. Our country cousins would come visit and all the little kids would get "kutos".
It is bizarre how crazy people here get about them. The reason lice "come back" is because they have the same resistance to insecticides that any arthropod develops over time AND you missed nits. The notion that they are "living" on car seats and couches is silly. Yes, vacuum, but invest in a good comb, those plastic ones don't cut it, and plan on combing everyone's hair for an hour a day for two weeks.
I grew up spending summers in the Philippines were lice are more common. Our country cousins would come visit and all the little kids would get "kutos".
It is bizarre how crazy people here get about them.
That's one contributing factor to why lice are more common in third world countries---people aren't freaking out about them. Just the fact the country cousins would infect everyone is a clue that not going crazy causes an increase prevalence.
The reason Americans freak out is because few people have enough time in their lives to spend an hour per day combing every head. For a big family, that equates to many hours. Then on top of that, there's all of the laundry. It's like having two full time jobs. And most Americans are two income households, or have super busy activity schedules that leave little time to devote to this. But they do because they don't want to get them back.
Quote:
Originally Posted by lkb0714
The notion that they are "living" on car seats and couches is silly. Yes, vacuum, but invest in a good comb, those plastic ones don't cut it, and plan on combing everyone's hair for an hour a day for two weeks.
It's not silly. Nobody is saying they live on car seats and couches. They can be transferred there though, especially for families that are constantly on the go in the car to multiple places per day. Everyone hops in and out, kids sitting in different seats. Boom. Transfer. If you don't vacuum the car and furniture out the day you do the treatment, you can transfer them back immediately. That's how you caught them from your country cousins.
I agree that combing is the most important. Many people don't have the patience to go through every single strand of hair.
You have a few options but YES you can do this by yourself. Here are the optiions:
-Rid/chemical lice treatment
-ALOT of conditioner
-Google lice treatment near you
For all of the above a THOROUGH cleaning of your house needs to be done. Top to bottom. Start by doing the laundry. Bag any pillows/ hair bows/ accessories for 2 weeks in a garbage bag. Do no reintroduce everything that is clean until the room has been entirely vaccuumed, including the mattress. Then you can reinstroduce those items, but not the bagged items for the next 2 weeks.
With all of the above hair treatment it takes patience to comb out the nits and lice. Break the hair into sections, doing as little as possible and starting as close to the scalp as possible. When done sectioning, go through the hair entirely again with the comb to ensure you got it all and nothing jumped to the other hair.
Obviously, the conditioner will not kill any of it. It will simply make it harder for the bugs to move, and will help the nit slide off.
You will have to check the hair every few days and repeat treatment if you find any bugs and or nits.
Now, in my area there are lice treatment centers. They provide an oil that kills the infestation that you apply at home and comb out. Then the very next day you go in and they use a heat treatment to zap the bugs. I don't know how well this works. There are also companies that will come in and show you how to rid your house of the infestation. I have never used that either.
Make sure the school is being ademate about cleaning the classroom when lice was found on the kids. We had an issue when DD caught lice 3 times in a very short period and iI KNEW I was doing my due diligence at home, and finally after writing the principle, it was cleaned properly and haven't had a problem since. Ever since then I go through my daughters hair weekly. That was 2 years ago.
My daughter is now 21, has not had lice for years. But once in awhile she will come up to me, and want a "lice check", meaning, "Mom, I want to lay on the sofa, with my head in your lap, and have you run your fingers through my hair.". Okay.
My daughter is now 21, has not had lice for years. But once in awhile she will come up to me, and want a "lice check", meaning, "Mom, I want to lay on the sofa, with my head in your lap, and have you run your fingers through my hair.". Okay.
You know I lived in Europe when I was younger and not once did I have lice. None of my sibings did either and when we moved to the states again , first year we were here we got them so bad and my one sister kept picking at her head and I remember my mother screaming she was brittish and did not know what it was and she sat there all morning long picking the lice off and dumping them into a jar filled with alcohol LOL it is funny now but not back then . She took the jar when she was done and went across the street and asked a neighbor what the bugs were and this lady told her and she came back and cleaned our whole house and dyed our hair and combed us out for hours with a metal lice comb LOL ....
That's one contributing factor to why lice are more common in third world countries---people aren't freaking out about them. Just the fact the country cousins would infect everyone is a clue that not going crazy causes an increase prevalence.
The reason Americans freak out is because few people have enough time in their lives to spend an hour per day combing every head. For a big family, that equates to many hours. Then on top of that, there's all of the laundry. It's like having two full time jobs. And most Americans are two income households, or have super busy activity schedules that leave little time to devote to this. But they do because they don't want to get them back.
It's not silly. Nobody is saying they live on car seats and couches. They can be transferred there though, especially for families that are constantly on the go in the car to multiple places per day. Everyone hops in and out, kids sitting in different seats. Boom. Transfer. If you don't vacuum the car and furniture out the day you do the treatment, you can transfer them back immediately. That's how you caught them from your country cousins.
I agree that combing is the most important. Many people don't have the patience to go through every single strand of hair.
No my siblings (not I) caught them because they shared beds. Even the CDC says the primary method of transfer is head to head contact. They also state the likelihood of getting them is "extremely low" from furniture, car seats, etc.
Lice is not any more prevalent in third world countries. That notion has long since been proven NOT true. In fact rates are frequently higher in the Europe than in Asia.
Finally, the fact that you think Americans are busier than other people is worthy of its own thread in another forum.
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