NITS.... I am at the end of my tether!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[poptot]

Please please help someone I have been battling since September now with ds and nits, he is only 2 and has beautiful thick hair but I am seriously considering shaving it off. Ever since we came back from France in the summer we have been struggling to get rid of the little buggers. Dd who is school age had them at the same time as me and ds initally and has about three eggs and one live one since. I have had them twice since then but ds only ever goes a couple of weeks before they're back. I could understand if it was dd as she is at school but none of ds's friends have had them. It's really making bedtime a misery with the combing and it takes two of us an hour to settle him and one to comb. We have tried various treatments and now I am at my wits ends. Would the GP be able to prescribe something stronger or can anyone reccomend anything. Sorry I know it's been done before but I've never heard of anyone having them so consistently.

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Poor you and ds, they ARE foul!
Which treatments have you tried?

Lots of conditioner (Tesco's tea tree 49p) and combimg is by far the best thing to use. It could be that if you have used lots of different sorts of chemical treatments that your poor ds's lice are now resistant to them. Your GP may be able to help - it's worth asking.

we've only used two chemical treatments for that reason. The thing about the conditioner is do I leave it on over night because at the moment I bath ds and do his hair and then snuggle him down, I can't bear the thought of sticking him back in the bath to rinse it off once he's all dry. At the momnet we just wet comb.

I smother the conditioner on and then comb it through while dd is in the bath, then rinse it off. Or I just use the conditioner to 'smooth' her hair and rinse it off, then comb through properly when she's dry iykwim!

Oh and use tea tree shampoo or put tea tree oil in the shampoo all the time to try and prevent them coming back.
hth

I wouldn't use chemicals as they really do not work.

The best method is the one Lucycat described or you could even try baby oil. Smother his hair in oil, comb through and then rinse off.
Do this every night for about 4 nights and then every other for another 10 days. Always works for me and believe me I have tried everything when dd sat next to a girl at school who was riddled with them.

have to agree with folks that the wet combing method is best.
get the bug busting kit - combs, full instruction leaflet and stickers etc which 2yo might like. buy it online from community health concern about 6 quid.
personally when infected I comb through every other night not 3-4 days as they recommend. takes about 2-3 weeks to get rid of them (assuming of course that reinfection is not occurring)
when you treat ds you must keep checking the rest of the family
put pressure on the school or playgroups to send notes home to get parents to check their children. some children it seems suffer no ill effects with nits and it can go unchecked so to speak

Get some tea tree oil from the chemist (a bit pricet though)and put just a few drops in with a spray bottle of water, sprey your ds hair and scalp daily, then wet comb, once they have gone continue to spray his scalp dailt with the tea tree oil to help prevent them coming back.

if that fails, try 1 tablespoon of vinega to a pint of water and dab on the scalp with a sponge daily, the lice hate them, but be very careful of getting it in your ds eyes. Vinega is also very good for prevention, and the hair will not smell of vinega once dried.

I also agree that wet combing is definately best. Tea tree oil is excellent, (although I can't stand the smell of it any more as it just reminds me of nits) if you shop around some places sell it really reasonably, I once got a 30ml bottle for about £1.50 from Aldi or Netto supermarket. I have also been told that neem oil is really effective, I think you can get this from Holland and Barrett or good chemists. Lice build up a resistance to the chemical solutions, I know from personal experience that they just don't seem to work My daughter was nit free several times but kept getting reinfected at school as some people were not bothering to check their kids hair even though letters were doing the rounds at school. I still check her hair regularly now just to make sure. Spending 5 or 10 minutes checking is the best prevention because if you let it get to the point where they are complaining of an itchy head then thats usually when you've got a pretty bad case of the little blighters on your hands. If you really want to try a chemical then the only one I could say did work once was Lyclear. I would not recommend any of the full marks stuff, it was rubbish. Hope this helps.