To wonder how my son has got headlice

[SunflowerSuit]

When we have been isolating for weeks?

I don’t get it! The internet says that you can’t catch them from cats.

The life cycle is 3 weeks so you need to treat weekly for 3 weeks or comb every few days for 3 weeks.

Eggs dont live in hats and they dont live in sand either. You missed some when you last treated as you didnt repeat the treatment to catch the lice hatching from eggs

I miss headlice.
We used to wash hair part dry and the kids would lay their heads in my lap and I would look at every section of hair and pull the eggs out .
You can see them as bumps on wet hair.

This is a very interesting thread. In the “olden days” a couple of months ago, there was always posts in FB class groups about “my child keeps getting nits... please check and treat your children because every time I get my child free of nits they get reinfected”. It would appear from this thread that actually it’s entirely possible that the child of the parent posting had just retained their own nits and they wee reinfecting themselves. No blame on the parent, but it’s fascinating that this can apparently happen.

This lockdown is a very good study of a lot of things! Also very interesting how many people have discovered they have mild having assumed previously that it was a mild cold they had.

DD has only has one outbreak off lice, she gave them to me to yuck. No need for treatments, they don't work 100% anyway, you need to wet come with conditioner ever three days for at lest three weeks. It's the only way to get rid of them permanently. I think most people just don't do it for long enough. Think the kids have picked them up again when it's just they haven't got rid of three first lot properly.

To properly get rid of lice you need to wet combine hair daily for 6 weeks, that's the length of the life cycle. Eggs are almost invisible until they are around 2 weeks old and hatched lice are also tiny, so are easy to miss.

Headlice are b***s to get rid of! They seem to like certain children. One of my DCs has them, we got rid of them and that was that, but the other DC got them and we spent weeks combing and checking.

IMO, the chemicals are crp and give a false sense of security. Combing through with conditioner and picking the little %@# out is the only way to clear a head. I also found something that had quassia in. I did the combing but added that and it worked very well and seemed to help keep them away too.

we are in the same boat. Treated my son the day the schools closed as he had them and last week he was scratching and he was absolutely infested again, I assumed I had missed an egg or 2 when I treated him as I had my own head checked and nothing and washed absolutely everything,including his cuddly toys that go to bed with him . I treated last week and followed up with another treatment yesterday and will condition and comb regularly. Little buggers. I don't think my combing technique was very good so going to work harder on that.

I meant to add that you have to comb every 3 days max to ensure you get them all. They’re cunning, tiny and hide!

I had headlice last year. I had a horrendously itchy scalp for around 6 weeks so obviously my first port of call was the nit comb. Couldn't find a thing. I went to the nurse at my gp practice because of this itching and she had a good look through it and said it wasn't headlice and prescribed me a steroid lotion.
A week later I was reading a book and one actually fell out onto a page . So I got the lotion and a comb expecting a bonanza and I think about 6 came out. My son had a really bad case but being a teen he self isolates as his hobby so I must have picked one up from a piece of furniture?
Anyway my point is that there must have been a lone inefficient breeder rambling around my head for weeks before it successfully expanded its family...

The life cycle isnt 6 weeks. Eggs hatch 7-10 days after being laid

www.chc.org/for-parents/

You dont pick lice up from furniture either

They have either simply been missed or he has picked them up at his dads.

Some people find nits more difficult to get rid of than others. Dd needs 3 treatments at day 1, 8 and 15. If I do this with me, it still doesn’t work and I use loads of Nitwits. This is the only, product, which works on me btw.

I’ve recently found a highly effective treatment if your dc will stand this. Wash hair. Use hairdryer on warm. Place at the scalp and dry for for 20-30 mins depending on the thickness and length of the hair. Repeat every other day for a fortnight to 3 weeks. Job done - even for me when I have in the past spent months upon months trying to get rid of them using a variety of methods...l

I read studies in this hair drying technique btw. It may only kill perhaps 50% (% varied in different studies) of the lice in one session but is far more effecting at drying out the nits. Over time, more and more lice are killed until they eventually all die out. All nits were heat blasted and died and once all lice are killed, the cycle is complete.

One treatment and some combing for a few days isn’t going to be effective for anyone. Therefore I also believe you didn’t get rid of them first time around. It takes time for them to colonise in quantities to be annoying and visible.

I know someone who has got them in the last couple of days - actually fits well with the life cycle that they erupt now after the end of school.

No mystery at all. You've answered your own question. He already had them before lockdown. Even a quick google gives you guidelines for treatment showing you have to repeat it at intervals of several days -
www.nhs.uk/conditions/head-lice-and-nits/ -

"Do wet combing on days 1, 5, 9 and 13 to catch any newly hatched head lice. Check again that everyone's hair is free of lice on day 17."

So your combing for a few days won't have got rid of them. You need to start from scratch and do the full course of treatment, plus wash bedding, towels, brushes etc to really be certain to have eradicated them.

If you can get hold of some NitWits treatment it works much better than conditioner. My DD2 had them for months on and off and this with the nittygritty comb was what finally saw them off...

I used to treat on days 1,8 and 15 like pp and that ensured they were all gone. I'd condition and comb outside of those times as well.

We had them 2 weeks ago I am usually so good at checking as well.
I had been itchy for about a week and assumed it was a new shampoo i was allergic to.
It wasn't until I saw one in Ds head that i realised. You can still go to a chemist to get a treatment if you want other than that its conditioner and a nitty gritty

Or it might have been something you ate.

@ElizabethMountbatten perhaps it's something you ate? It can be pretty difficult to tell. We've all been very sneezy but I'm assuming hayfever even though I thought I didn't get it. Obviously had passed it off as a cold in the past

@Hunnybears could be hay fever.

Nittygritty combs are excellent. Online. Just need that and cheap conditioner.

The only way to get rid of nits is combing with lots of conditioner every 2 days for about 3 weeks. This is a real pain and depending on the age of your child I would consider shaving all his hair off, as it will have grown back before lock down is over and if he is little will be less stressful