Nit virgin - what's the story?

[Poppycake]

I think I just found lice in dd1's hair. Will hurry on down and get the comb etc from boots tomorrow, but was wondering - she is meant to be starting school on Monday (i.e. 1st day ever!). Is she not going to be able to go? I'm not sure how this works? What are other people's experience with schools?

If children with nits didn't go to school, clasrooms would be half empty.

If a parent informs the school, in my experience the school send home a standard letter explaining about wet combing, but you can bet your life not every parent tells the school.

That sounds right! Am a bit concerned because although it's a state school, there's a lot of Millicents and Antonias, if you get my drift, and at the parent info day they went on a lot about nits, but now I want to remember what they said I can't really!

Get lotion tomorrow, treat and wash presto! can go to school.
Get type that is quick. though they can be greasy may need to wash twice.
Just found headlice and eggs on two of my DDs

The posher the folk the less worried about nits they seem to be.IME

Have a look at the other nit threads, Poppycake. Lots of people are against the quick chemical lotions.

Nitty Gritty is teh best treatment IMO.

it is also the most social treatment.

With the chemicals you treat on day 1. Get rid of the lice, but then all the eggs they have laid spend the next 7 days hatching and you have to treat again on day 7 to be completely clear.

BUT with the Nitty Gritty - this comb removes the eggs as well as the lice - and whilst you may not remove 100% of the eggs on first try you should remove a good half of them...so less likely to spread them.
With teh Nity Gritty you have to comb every 3-4 days for 2 weeks for it to be effective.

thanks everybody! Off to get equipped... Have been scratching my own head ever since!

Hedrin is the only treatment on the market that has been proven to work it can only be brought from the pharmacy counter.

it has no chemicals and works by suffocating the lice so its insides explode!!!

one 50ml bottle will do a childs head twice as it needs doing one week then the next.

put on an hr before bed so it has time to dry then wash off in morning.

has no odour as no chemicals - no chemicals = safe to use on excema and asthma sufferers.

can be got on prescription and brought over counter

Lindsey...no it is not.

Other "proper" chemical treatmetns (i.e. the insecticides) have also been clinically proven...it s just that the lice are now becoming resistent.

I believe that teh "bug busting" method has also been clincally proven - which is, in essence, what the Nitty Gritty comb method is based on. Nitty Gritty has the added advantage that it kills and removes the* eggs which no other treatment will do.

IMO the Nitty Gritty will beat Hedrin hands down in a clinical trial. And IMO the only reason that Nitty Gritty has not been subjected to a clinical trial (yet) is that it is manufactured by a company which is probably too small to afford to fund a clinical trial.

Was also a nit virgin until the holidays ...

What about these things marketed as nit deterrents. What's in them? Do they work?

They usually have some combination of Tea tree, neem oil, lavendar oil in.

Some people claim they work. Difficult to prove or disprove TBH.

You can add a few drops of tea tree oil to a normal bottle of conditioner and it works out miles cheaper (although the tea tree oil is v expensive to start with it goes a long way).

Tea tree is hte one mostly quoted and the lice are not supposed to like the smell. It is a deterrent though not a treatment or absolute preventative.

well, I went for a combo of the nit comb and the tea tree/neem/lavendar oil preparation. Smelt absolutely rank, but no nasty side effects - also she'd eaten a lot of garlic bread which meant that at least the tea tree was taking away the smell of that

Going to pick her up from her first day - was very glad of the reassurance that she didn't have to miss that, so thanks all!

I just use the nit comb. I don't like the thought of insecticide on the head. The comb just gets the lice out, but not the eggs. So you have to redo in about a week to get rid of the hatched lice.

Which Nit comb do you use.

The NITTTY GRITTY does get the eggs out so really is the most effective treatment available so long as it is done properly.

If you use a comb you have to leave a maximum of 4 days bewteen the combings to break the life cycle. 7 days is too long.

As we were on holiday, I had to hone my vocabulary and buy a French nit comb and lotion. The comb is incredibly fierce - it's done terrible damage to my child's hair, which is now full of split ends - but it does get the eggs out, unlike the English nit comb I didn't bother to take on holiday. So perhaps this is like the Nitty Gritty comb.

The nitty gritty is quite harsh. I only ever use it with masses of conditioner, and try to avoiding it unless we have an outbreak or reasn to believe an outbreak.

My DTDs have bum length hair and have minimal split ends. No more than I would expect 18m after a haircut [oops]

Nitty Gritty pulls half my hair out (I used it to check my own head once, not looking forward to having to use it more often ) but I checked dd with it with masses of leave in tea-tree conditioner, and it seemed ok on her.

First week of Reception and no lice apparent yet....