Should you be able to SEE nits?

[toweling]

Trying to reassure myself at this time on a Sunday night.

My DC haven't had nits yet but very coincidentally we have ALL had an itchy head for a few days.

I can't see ANYTHING in my DC's hair at all. I've checked multiple times with a headtorch and dry combed it with a nit comb and nothing.

Should this reassure me enough? Is it likely to find them just by looking? Or do you really need to do the conditioner and wet hair combing route?

You will notice them…my DD was itching for a while and I never noticed anything at first, but I lifted her hair up and looked at the nape of the neck…was crawling with lice !

they tend to hide underneath.

you will see them though…place white tissue underneath and then draw the nitcomb from root to tip. It will show up on the paper if there’s anything!

No! I thought the same. You can’t see them, you can occasionally see the empty egg cases (white, looks like dandruff, but glued to the hair about halfway down) but you can’t see the bugs themselves. You have to cover the hair in conditioner/product and comb through, preferably with a nitty gritty comb, actually find them and the eggs. My DS has short hair and only when I wet combed did any nits show up… and he had loads!

When DS had them I thought they were really obvious when I had a good look.

I think wet combing is the only way to be certain. I can never see the buggers. People say they can but I do not have the gift.

You can see nits walking on the scalp.

I couldn’t, obviously, and I looked very hard at my DS short hair.

I don’t have this gift either!

The Nits (eggs) are harder to see than the head lice themselves but still possible, especially in darker hair where they stand out more. They are white and stick firm to the hair shaft.

The head lice are sometimes small, but much bigger than eg fleas. Second or third generation head lice can be much bigger. I’ve taught children who have scratched their head and a few have fallen out onto a page of the work book they were writing in!

Depends on whether they're newly hatched or mature adults. New ones are like a speck of dust, full grown about the size of a grain of Basmati.

An easy spot check I used to do was a few drops of lavender essential oil on the parting, above the ears and the back of the head. Wait one minute (doing the same for the next child) and by the time you return to the first, any illegal aliens will be coming up to the surface for air, at which point the kids would sigh as it meant a full on condition and comb again.

Lavender's less irritating to the scalp than neat Tea tree.

@freespirit333 you absolutely can see the lice. My DDs had them once and didn’t have the eggs as I caught them the day they were transferred from a play date. They look like fleas. I used cheap conditioner and a nitty gritty comb and wiped into white kitchen paper. Their bodies are hard and you can pop them.

Mix of answers!

I think I'm going to have to just bite the bullet and wet comb tomorrow to check and hope that I haven't been able to see anything for good reason.

It just seems too coincidental that allll of our heads are itchy at the same time though... if I have bits I think I'll cry!

They're white when nobody's at home, they're dark like sand or grit when occupied.

I could never see them on dry hair. I would use the not comb on wet hair covered in conditioner- that gets them out.

When my daughter got nits, they were crawling round the nape of her neck. It was foul. I spent her entire primary education battling the bastard things. Weirdly, DS has never had them. But yes, you can see them and the eggs and the cases.

Nits are the eggs, lice lay them.

So I think it depends on the colour of the hair. I was helping at my DC's school and one girl with black hair was very obviously utterly riddled with nits, it was disgusting. All down the hair, these white eggs. Horrifying.
I didn't see any actual lice though.

Fairer DC I don't think you can see them but a wet comb will help. Put the comb straight into a bowl of water after every draw to drown the bugs.

Top tip - the stuff in hair serum is the same as the nit lotion so I often put a bit through DC's hair to try to put the lice off.

When the lice first hatch they are like a small grain of sand, very hard to see and take on the colour of the hair they're on.
By the time those lice are great grandparents (new generation every 7 days) they will be the size of a sesame seed... So then they are much more obvious.
The eggs are like tiny dandruff specks, they are glued to the hair shaft fairly close to the scalp. So if it's dandruff it will be loose and blow away, if it's eggs you'll have to use your nails to dislodge it and slide it off the hair.

Is it true that head lice don't like afro and mixed race hair because of the greasy conditioning products kids with this type of hair use?

I couldn't see them at all on DD! Only when the hair was wet. I thought I'd be able to but I really couldn't!

You can see the eggs (the nits) stuck to the hair, usually behind the ears/under the hair at the back, as those places are warmest. Though these are white, and therefore may be harder to spot on very light coloured hair.

Agree to biting the bullet but you might be okay. I've been totally paranoid this term after DS had them all last term and is still blooming itching. But I checked and checked and haven't found anything. Took him to the barbers recently and he also got the all clear from them (after announcing in the chair that he sits still nicely when I check his hair for bugs 😂).

The more you scratch the more you itch, so you might just be in a self perpetuating cycle. This thread alone is bringing on the phantom itching!!

I think it depends on your eyesight, whether you know what to look for, the colour of your child's hair and how long they have had them. My DD had them loads of time in infant school and I could only ever seem to find them by using a nit comb on wet hair with conditioner (wiping it on white tissue after each strand). My mum (who a the time had incredible eye sight and many years of experience in dealing with nits) claimed to be able to see lice and eggs just by parting the hair slightly.
The only time I was able to see them without combing was on DD's friend (who I suspect may have been the source of our re-infections as her mum claimed she didn't believe in chemical treatments but she said she had a special comb that caught them all dry). The lice were HUGE and some fell out of her hair on to her white school shirt.

It depends what stage they are at. My girl had eggs but we didn’t see any crawling around, it looks like dandruff but will not budge if you try to wipe away. This was when she first started at reception and I was a little naive about the spread of headlice.

If you suspect it, I’d just pop a treatment on. We also use the nit defence spray and do very tight French plaits now, my DD hasn’t had any since - although we get regular messages there are outbreaks in her class.

The rest of us didn’t get nits, sometimes the itching is psychological. I feel itchy now just thinking about it lol.

No need to add treatments. Just comb with a good nit comb and cheap conditioner regularly.

My children weren't blessed with lice more than a couple of times. I was putting DD1's hair up one morning and saw a louse casually strolling from the nape of her neck into her hair. Tbf, she has very fine, wispy hair, so there wasn't anywhere for it to hide.

I'm hoping it's definitely psychological.

I'm just more panicked that I have them! I have so much hair to get through. AND it's falling out like crazy at the moment, and I worry that having to drag a nit comb through it multiple times might be the last step in making me bald!