AIBU to give up and let the bum worms win?

[BumWormFatigue]

Seven blissful weeks ago, I'd never heard of pinworms / threadworms. Then our toddler was beside himself trying to itch his bum one night, and after researching and looking in everyone's poo, I confirmed pinworms in all four of us 🤢.

Bought Ovex and dosed the household. Cut nails, boil washed everything, thorough showers and fresh towels every morning for everyone. Shampooed the carpet, bought new pillows for the children etc etc. We all take our shoes off and wash hands when coming home anyway, but also bought a nail brush for added thoroughness.

10 days later, toddler up again trying to scratch. GP recommends early 2nd dose, which we all have. Same again two weeks later. We still all have pinworms.

I am sick of laundry and getting up early to shower two furious small children before nursery. The cure is beginning to feel worse than the disease, seeing as three of us are asymptomatic, and the toddler is only bothered periodically. A bit of piriton and sudocrem on his bumhole seems to sort it on nights he is bad. Also, I've spent an absolute fortune on Ovex, which is money we don't have.

So AIBU to just ignore the problem? Or should I carry on all the extra cleaning / getting up early / Ovex indefinitely?

Any miracle cures for the little buggars appreciated too, if anyone has one.

Some people apparently can’t feel them. Just saying 😱

How would it? It kills all of them at once. The reason why it doesn't work sustainably is because it doesn't have any mechanism to kill the eggs. The eggs have already been laid by the time the worms get killed so it's not like the "ovex-resistant" worms survive to lay extra eggs or anything.

You have to redose to kill the worms which hatch out of the eggs which were left behind. The UK packaging/leaflet says to do this 2 weeks later, and to dose everyone in the family so you don't reinfect each other in a hideous cycle. The instructions where I live say to redose every day for three days, and I find it works much better. But they are also much more on top of it in nurseries and don't let your child attend until it's confirmed gone by a doctor. It's so much nicer - DS1 used to pick them up constantly and drive me absolutely mad because I'd catch them from him every time 🤢 I'm convinced some people also don't notice the sensation and if they don't have good hygiene, they're probably the ones infecting everyone else.

One ovex treatment is not enough in my experience. You need to do it about 3 times over a few days.

It can cause malnutrition and intestinal blockages if left untreated. So I’d definitely keep going with the treatment OP. It’s also horrible for them to be itching when trying to sleep.

Be gentle with me here.

DH gets worm. Yes, a grown man. I do not get them. We both work in primary schools. The big difference is that he bites his nails.

WHAT THE HELL ARE BUM WORMS ?!!!

Oh my word, how do you all know so much and I’ve never heard of them !!!

My kids had them while staying at grandparents abroad last summer (in Europe).
They were prescribed Ovex for three days twice a day.
They've not had them since!

Kind of exactly what it sounds like… Small parasitic worms that live in the digestive system and come out in the stool of people with an infestation. It’s really not nice. 😭 Like when you worm a dog, but different type of worm.

Luckily I've never had worms but would steaming work to kill the eggs? (Obviously on soft furnishings, teddies, etc - not bumholes 🙈)

I've just had a terrible few months with my dog getting fleas constantly - I used all the pesticides on the market, nothing was shifting them. In the end I bought a steamer and blasted the sofa/rugs/dog bed and luckily haven't had any problems since.

It's easier to steam than wash all the toys too.

Exactly. I had these as a kid for one reason and one reason only: I never washed my hands after using the toilet. It was a big lesson learned and I've been a fastidious handwasher since. Worms are transmitted fecal/oral route. If all the family is still getting them it's likely that little one is not washing hands, then touching things that others in the household will touch, and they're ingesting the germs when eating etc. And so the cycle continues.

You might need to take a more broad spectrum treatment to treat hook worms, round worms and tapeworms. Do you have access to dogs and cats?

There will always be someone at childcare with worms.

Practise hand washing after toileting and before eating.
Deter hands in mouths, thumb, finger or pencil sucking.
Wash door knobs on house and car, toilet seats and buttons, clothing, towels, bedding, keyboards, phone and remotes etc

I have heard of people taking herbs and drinking Turmeric.

Everyone who bites their nails or puts their fingers in their mouth is risking re-infecting themselves. In addition to washing bedding etc (on a hot cycle) you need to be militant about washing hands with soap (after the toilet, before eating, when they come home from nursery).

Life is too short for all that washing and hoovering I decided after a few infestations. So I just give the ovex more often which seemed to work. I think maybe once a week for theee weeks we did. I then maintenance dosed him every month or two but I didn’t bother dosing us again as we didn’t seem to catch them off him. It went on though much of primary school so unfortunately you might have to budget for lots of ovex (one reason we didn’t do the adults all the time).

The threat of having to drink Pripsen ever again was enough to turn me militant about hand washing. That stuff was VILE! Never any more worms for me!

It sounds like the strain your family have has developed a resistence to ovex. I think you need to speak to a pharmacist.

@GertrudePerkinsPaperyThing the pink medicine 😖 I can still remember the taste

Make sure you’re wiping bedroom furniture down as the eggs get thrown everywhere when getting undressed or taking bedding off

Oh god, bum worms are the worst!

Agree you’re doing everything right, and the other suggestions made by PPs are also excellent. All I wanted to add was to make sure all fruit and veg is thoroughly rinsed before you eat it.

As some pp have already suggested, ovex/boots equivalent morning and evening for 3 days. I know it's not the instructions in this country, but we had a particularly bad infestation so i googled ovex and the NHS prescribes it for other types of worms at this dose, so i was confident to give my 6 yo this. The rest of us didnt even have worms! but his poo was half solid worms after we got the right dosage. Grim.

I thought we had it luckily only my one dc seemed to we did ovex, I washed everyone's bedding daily for the first 3 days may have done dcs bedding for 5 days washing the actual duvet itself on the first day. Hovered high traffic areas and dc bedroom daily first 3 days and also damp dusted dc bedroom and bleached and wiped all his toys. Cut the nails put boxers and pj's on before bed slather Vaseline. Change boxers every night and morning for the first 5 days maybe more and bum wash every morning and night and then hose the bath after that. I also ditched towels for drying hands we where using kitchen roll and straight into a bin obviously handwriting too I also bought antibacterial hand wipes for dc and wiped the toilet after he went with antibacterial everytime. Luckily no one else caught them did second dose of ovex 2 weeks later and thankfully all clear. Could it be a nurse issue getting reinfected? I've heard pineapple juice is good to so I give him some of that. As others have said aswell keep toothbrushes away

I wouldn’t worry too much about the showering tbh or the mad laundering of bedsheets. Just a dose of Ovex once a week for as long as it takes. Adjust your diet, dodge sugar, you want plenty of garlic, fibre salads made with grated carrots. Thoroughly wash hands. Vaseline on bums at night.

Eventuslly you will succeed in breaking the cycle.

I’m sure I read that something like ten percent of the population have threadworms at any one time 🤢 lots of people are asymptomatic and sometimes only notice when there’s a population explosion.

You can't leave them. Not least because they can go into your vagina and HURT.

I do sympathise though, I wanted to run away when we had them in the house.

Definitely Vaseline on bum, tell nursery and ask pharmacist / GP if you can take higher / Moore frequent doses of meds

Then he needs to stop biting his nails. It’s grim for a grown man to continually get worms, my vagina would be zipped shut until he learns to wash his hands, stop biting his nails and learn how to stop getting infestations of worms.

We had them last year and I followed the advice, washed all bedding at 60 for 2 weeks and took the ovex doses a week apart. Then, a couple of weeks later my daughter started getting fidgety in bed again, this time it was just before I was about to have surgery so not ideal timing 🙄 I'd read that the eggs can live for 2 weeks outside of your body, so I bought more ovex and we followed the instructions for a week apart, then I gave us another dose 2 weeks after just to be bloody sure!!! I also told her nursery, not sure if they did anything but she wasn't great at washing her hands after the toilet at home so I wanted them to keep an eye on that too!