Head lice

[Fish]

Go to www.nits.net/bugbusting for some vital tips on breaking the louse life cycle amongst the whole family. It's put out by a charity - Community Hygiene Concern - who do an excellent Bug-Busting comb kit for under a fiver with stickers for the kids and masses of advice for people with all kinds of different hair types - address CHC (BBG), 160 Inderwick Rd N8 9JT, tel 020 8341 7167.

tsarvo - if i can get rid of them i would be quite prepared to add a drop of tea tree to the shampoo once a week for the rest of my children's life! A small price to pay......! I have the tea tree oil ready and waiting in the bathroom.

Ejanes - try using a normal conditioner on ds too - it maybe that your nits have immunity to the particular chemical you are using so it will not kill them off. This is one of the problems of everyone using Head Lice lotions - the little sods build up immunity to the stuff!!! Also I no longer use the nit combs from the chemist, instead I use a dog or cat flea comb - they tend to have better handles so are easier to use - yes I took the nit comb into a pet shop to compare 'teeth' and they are the same.

thanks jaybee - good idea about the comb - i've been doing it so much that the 1/2 the teeth a missing! I am constantly stunned by the range and depth of issues that parenthood covers! My poor ds was throwing up all of last night (along with 6 classmates and 2 teachers) so i think i'll give him a night off tonight.

Haven't read all this thread, but I've just bought one of those electric combs on a whim, since ds has been itching and his friends have lice. It electrocutes the critters.
Anyone used one?

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Just a warning with the teatree oil - be very careful it doesn't get into your or your child's eyes (or mouth).

As for the itching, I scratch just thinking about the horrible little buggers!

Thank god there are people who understand what I am going through. We are currently on day 10 of our infestation and am coming ds religiously day and night. I feel like a mother monkey constantly picking and combing and the poor boy can't sit next to me without me manhandling his hair!

We found his nits the day before I was going to the hairdressers - the first time in over a year - and although I checked about amillion times before I went and got dp to check (no help) I was still absolutely terrified throughout the whole haircutting process. I had this image in my head of the hairdresser suddenly screaming and the whole place turning to look and this lice ridden monster. Paranoid? I was actually clear at the time but have now discovered the first few little buggers. Can I use chemical lotions if I am breastfeeding? I will try the conditioner and comb treatment and have bought some tea tree shampoo. Is it better to use the pure oil mixed with normal shampoo or are the tea tree shampoos good enough?

How long on average does an infetation last?

I meant combing ds - sorry!

VJR - as you will see from my posts i have been going through the same hell as you but am pleased to say i think we finally have a nit free household - there were times when i thought the day would never come. I picked up tips from this thread and tried literally everything. What worked best for me was.....:- for my DS a lotion called (something like) Debac-M which you leave on dry hair overnight, wash out in the morning & nit comb. I found the best place to comb my ds's hair (2 1/2yrs) was in the bath when he was playing with toys and distracted, also this way the nits drown and no chance of them crawling to infest anyone / anything else (although i don't know if this can happen). For me, (i am p/g so couldn't use chemicals like you) i doused my hair in olive oil overnight at someone's very good avice and that seemed to work. Also buy the wire nit combs from boots rather than using the white plastic ones that come with the conditioners, they seem to catch a lot more! Sorry i haven't had a chance to credit all the brilliant advice given here to their rightful owners!! Thanks again for all the advice everyone gave me as, eventually it got our household clean, i hope it works for VJR

Thanks ejanes - I will buy a metal nit comb today.

my dd has suffered with nits on and off since starting school, she is now nine. there are approx 750 children in her school ( the size of a secondary school ), so keeping her nit free for a long period is impossible. i don't even bother telling the school anymore when she has them. all they do is send out a letter to the affected class and just pray that the mothers read the letter, let alone check their childrens hair. i used to use the chemicals and tried most of them, but it was getting a joke, so switched to tea tree, conditioner and the nit comb. she has so many eggs in her hair that it's embarassing putting it up cos you can see them. she won't let me sit and pick them out, though it would take a lifetime and i prefer her hair was tied up at school anyway.
i'm just sick of the parents who have the attitude to say 'oh there's no point, she'll only get them again'. yes, maybe thats true, but if you wash and condition your hair with tea tree every time and then run the nit comb through, maybe it would keep them at bay. i feel i'm fighting a losing battle. bring back the nit nurse...............PLEASE!!!!!

We have managed to escape the dreaded lice until now, which I suppose is prettygood going as d.s. is now 7! My d.d. however, has headlice or at least she did have. I spotted them last Saturday and (before having read all the great sdvice on this thread) treated her and myself with Prioderm and gave her a really good going over with the nit comb. I found 4 lice in her hair (and 1 in mine) but she had hundreds of eggs. It took me hours to pick them out and I continued to comb every day before taking her to school. She was clear for 2 days and when I checked her head today, I found dozens of bloody eggs again.

I do know her best friend at school has h.l. too and that letters have gone home giving advice etc. For the past 4 days, though, I have found no lice, so how can there be more eggs? Are they just very good at hiding? I thought I was so thorough. Anyway, I have kept her home from school today, explaining why to teacher and spent 2 1/2 hours going through her hair picking out the nits, before doing a final comb through with conditioner. Must admit to being a bit p**d off when I saw my d.ds little friend at school with her very long hair hanging loose. Surely some things are just common sense.

OXOCUBE
i know how frustrating it is to see the little girls in the playground with long hair that isn't tied up. alot of the attitudes with the parents is, that lice problems are going to occur because of the amonut of children in the school. they don't seem to stop and think about how to keep it under control, by checking regularly and tying hair up every day. it is getting beyond a joke now. my daughter has so many eggs in her hair, yet again, there's no way she would let me sit and pick them all out. it's very embarassing for her and she's very conscious of it. i think it's time that all long hair in school should be tied up for health and safety reasons.

Our electric comb is brilliant. I worried about using insecticides on young children, my son was only a year old when we got our first infestation. The insecticides can be absorbed through the child's skin. Anyway, I use conditioner and a steel comb on wet hair and electocution on dry hair. By the way, you hear a satisfying 'fizz' as the lice die. I comb every couple of days for a fortnight to catch all the beasts before they reach adulthood and can breed.

Just wanted to say that we are lice free and feeling rather joyous about it. It took 2 weeks of daily combing to get rid of the little buggers but we are finally free - Hoorah!

I had a very strange dream last night that DS had lice as big as wood lice - very disturbing. I hope it's not a premenition (sp?) !!!!

Just invested in an electric comb, which the kids much prefer. It's brill! Ds calls it 'the electrocutor'