Burn it all. We have lice.
We aren’t dirty people. I mean at times I have a dirty mind at times. But I’m enduring a 15 month deployment. Furthermore, we do some sort of cleaning everyday. So when I thought my youngest kid had fleas a few weeks back (I hear you laughing); I freaked. So the dog got blamed and all the animals got washed. ALL the animals. His look says it all.
Don’t they look thrilled! I mean who doesn’t want a spa day. They were complete assholes. But now they were clean assholes.
So I pulled everything the kid came in contact with and was cleaning every freakin linen I could get my hands on for this “flea infestation” I thought we had. Key word is THOUGHT. I was in denial.
Yea. Because it wasn’t fleas after all. It was lice.
Luckly when Chicken Little’s teacher contacted me from school about her complaining of her itchy head, my “it’s always the worst” feeling kicked in. I picked up Lice treatment before I picked up her at school.
Poor kid was up until 2 am while I was shampooing and combing through her head. She was literally asleep sitting up. I now know where the term “nit picker” came from.
Everyday since then, I have been checking everyone’s head morning and night. Luckily, I have only found a few nits and no lice on Chicken Little.
Wait your saying. What’s a nit. Exactly.
I have a habit of researching the crap out of things I don’t understand.
The morning after I found the lice I spent hours looking at sites and reading posts regarding lice and how to get rid of them and not burn your house down in the process.
The main thing I learned: Don’t panic. I learned adult lice can only live like a day away from a human host. Which means all that bagging crap up for weeks at a time is useless. The eggs (nits) only live hours away from a human host.
What you need to know about lice:
- They they don’t care if you do a white glove test everyday. Cleanliness doesn’t matter.
- Just like every living thing they have a life cycle. Eggs are called “nits”. Which hatch into “nymphs”. Who grow in to a “louse” (plural is “lice”).
- The first place to look if you suspect lice is behind the ears and on the neckline.
- If you can easily pull a nit off, it’s probably not a nit. I pulled so hard to get them off, I pulled out the strand of hair itself.
- Pets don’t spread human lice. So washing my cats was useless.
- Lice don’t jump.
- They don’t like heat. So burning the house down could work. But you can also blow dry hair and put everything that can go in the dryer on the highest heat setting you have for about 50 minutes as a easier option.
I felt like a failure as a housewife and a mother. I thought only dirty houses and dirty kids got lice. Boy was I uneducated. However, now that we are experiencing our second go of lice (don’t get me started), I didn’t feel like I needed 10 shots of tequila to deal with it.
Hopefully educating yourself on it makes you feel a little less grossed out.