Head Lice - Lewisburg,OH

Please go to headlice.org and get informtion about head lice. So much stuff on the market is useless and just a waste of money. Please go and read all the information at this web site. I have over 13 years in child care and this is the site I always send my parents. It is informative and correct. We have had lice twice and I did not use the shampoos or any other chemical on the market. I washed the girls waist length hair in normal shampoo and conditioned it to make combing easier. I parted her hair off into about 50 pony tails and combed each one, removing live bugs and any nits, putting the nits into a glass of water. She never had a flare up days later due to every bug and nit being gone.

As long as the hair is wet it is easy to see nits and bugs. I used a lighted magnifying glass from Staples to see but my friend didn't use any device to help. All 3 kids were lice free that day by following these instructions.

If you scroll down further on questions there is another recent post about this. It has a lot of great responses. Good Luck!

My daughter had a friend over when they were younger and she was sitting at our table telling us she had lice. I couldn't believe it! Why would her parents let her go to a friends house when she knew her and her sister had it? I washed and washed in very hot water and vacumed and washed all the dolls and kept going through her hair. I went thru the self check out lane when I bought the stuff and a worker came over to help. Kind of embarrassing but it happens. Maybe give her a hair cut? You will probably get it too. just sayin. Good Luck!

You need to wash with the special shampoo, then nit-pick every night for a week, then wash with the special shampoo again. Those little eggs are so tiny that even the special combs can miss them and some hatch.
The live lice are killed by the shampoo but the eggs (nits) are not. So pick them out as much as you can. Then when they hatch 7-10 days later you shampoo again before those nits can mature and lay eggs themselves. Also remember that the lice and eggs need human body heat to live, so if they fall on the floor or stay in a cold car in the garage they tend to die in about 48 hours.
By the way, buy the metal combs at CVS since they are much easier to use than the thicker plastic ones that come with the shampoo. We used conditioner in her hair to make the metal combs slide through easily and then filled the sink with super hot water and swished them clean in the hot water after every pass through the hair. I started on one side of her head and worked my way over the top in little 2" swatches. My daughter has long hair too.
We even did a third shampoo treatment after 14 days just to make sure. Also, we should have treated everyone in the family, since 14 days later my older daughter had them even though when i checked her she did not seem to have any. It is not as gross or scary as it seems, they can be conquered. Our nurse said that you can simply put the sheets in the dryer for 30 minutes instead of washing them every night. Stuff you cannot wash can be put in the freezer for 4 hours which also kills the eggs and nits.
Hang in there, and to prevent future infestations the school nurse recommended not letting my daughter wear her hair loose but put it in braids so that it does not swing around so much.

Tea tree oil is a godsend to lice, lice hate it. Use a few drops directly on her scalp and mix in with whatever shampoo. The lice shampoos are pesticides, you really do NOT want to use them, they are ineffective. Now that you have treated her hair, spend a few hours DAILY going through her hair, almost strand by strand, doing this for at least a week. If you don't pick out the nits, they will hatch and start the whole thing all over again. You could also have them, have someone check your head, here we go to a home care nurse and they will have a look for free. Get a bottle of tea tree oil, and use it once a month or so once the lice are gone, it has worked well for us. My 3 kids and myself all had lice 2 years ago, it was a battle, but we got rid of them, but only by going their hair daily for a week, especially my daughter who has shoulder length very thick hair.

Also search through past posts, there is lots of great information on here.

Check out Fairy Tales hair care for lice prevention and removal. (fairytaleshaircare.com). I use it on my preschool daughter's hair for prevention, but they also have products for kids who already have lice. I hear it works well. Good luck!

I just answered the other post on this. But, you want to check out

www.seattlemamadoc.seattlechildrens.org.

It's a blog written by a Seattle pediatrician/mom, and she posts about her and her son getting head lice the night before their Christmas trip (!). It's very informative and helpful. You can use the search feature to look for lice. Her most recent blog post will be shown.

Good luck!

You should both try tea tree oil/tea oil shampoo.

Unfortunately what we ended up doing was combing out the kids' hair every night and putting the girl in braids every night for about a month. We put an old sheet down to catch whatever and then washed it in very hot water after.

Don't forget to re-do in a week or so to catch whatever may have been missed after the first shampoo.

I just read in a book that putting mayonnaise all over her scalp then put a shower cap and leave it in as long as possible. Overnight if possible. Then shampoo as usual using a fine toothed comb to get any remaining lice bodies. Repeat in a week. I would be desperate in this situation and try everything. I had it when I was a kid and it sucks. I didnt try this method but it might help. Good Luck!