Headlice (merged)

sticher

and the girls said it gave them a mild electric shock - just the aversion therapy needed to remind them not to sit next to that bl**dy girl/boy who keeps giving them to them

LOL that made me laugh!

Lice can survive on pillows, etc, so he could be picking them up from furniture/bedding.

I have found that wet combing is by far the most reliable/cheapest method of getting rid of nits. I do it every other night until 1 week after I find the last one and then every 3 nights for a week. I have never had a recurrence using this method.

From the sound of it though your son does not have nits, but fleas. Maybe try some Frontline on him - JOKE!!!!!

bestpud

I would question if they are head lice too as I've never seen one of them jump!

We have only once used a treatment and it was less than useless, so since then I've just wet their hair, stuck in some conditioner and used a metal nit comb - the plastic ones have teeth that are too spaced out for their very fine hair! I wipe the comb in kitchen roll so it is easy to see any that come out.

I usually sit them in front of the TV, as it keeps then quiet! I do it every three days for a fortnight if I ever find they have them and then once a week for the next two weeks, just in case!

Saying that, we haven't had a problem for about 4 years now, thank goodness! This method always works but it is a bit time consuming, though much kinder than pesticides imo.

2girlsforme

My daughter has had nits a couple of times since starting school in August, the best way I have found is slapping on loads of conditioner and going through the hair with the nitty gritty comb section by section. Pulling off any eggs between 2 fingernails, takes ages - she has got long hair (wants to be like rapunzel - imagine de-nitting that :eek: ) she doesn't complain too much which is amazing because she moans when I brush her hair any other time - but the threat of having it all cut off stops her!!

I sit with a head torch on which really helps to show up the eggs, but makes me look like a right twit :rolleyes: husband know if he comes home from work and sees the headtorch - we've got beasties :rotfl:

I do this every couple of days for a couple of weeks, it can take 10 - 14 days for an egg to hatch and each live beast can lay 9 eggs per night. Nightmare!

By the way in Scotland you can get the nitty gritty comb free if you are registered with a chemist for the small items thing. Not sure if that applies to the rest of the country - otherwise it costs £10 but it really is the best.:T

Carmina_Piranha_3

spendless they look like the headlice in the first pic on your link.

my mum commented on the fact that he's only ever had big ones and we've never seen a single egg on him so she reckons they're coming onto him when they're big and i'm catching them straight away.

as for them jumping, both my mum and husband say i need new glasses :rolleyes: and perhaps i was shaking them off the tissue because they make me shudder? eldest said he only saw them crawling around on the tissue, he didn't see any jumping.

eldest head's quite scabby but that could be from scratching.

sorry if anyone thinks i'm being nasty about these girls, it's not what i meant. they're lovely girls. i was just trying to explain the lack of contact between the girls and my eldest - hence me wondering if they can be transferred by car seats etc.

as for high school kids tasting bad, he's only had them since starting high school.

mshappy

When i was younger I use to have them constantly.We'd use tea tree shampoo and conditioner and just wet comb daily.Never seemed to get them when I went to High school.

Karensteps

I wish I never read this thread now, my head is feeling itchy!

My younger sister kept getting nits, and giving them to me, oh god I hated it, I always felt so dirty with them, when I went to secondary school, I never had them, even though she still kept getting them. Very odd.

My sister when younger had blonde hair, so the nits were easy to spot, but a couple of times we saw red ones!! The nurse said that she must of caught them off someone with ginger hair as they try and "blend in" with their surroundings. I don't know about that but my sisters nits always seemed to be browner than mine, or maybe i'm just dillusional.

Can't stop scratching my head now

SmellyOldSock

My stepkids regularly have nits, its a nightmare.

The best thing we do is cover their hair in veg oil, cover for 20-30 minutes and then comb. It suffocates the little beasts and makes the eggs easy to remove. Wash hair, using washing up liquid (otherwise its really greasy) the conditioner.

I must admit I do wash all their bed linen and towels etc to stop re-infection. Also read that dry heat kills them too, so the girls are encouraged to use my hair dryer.

best wishes
Charlotte

ps my head is really itchy, better check just to be sure!

geekgirl

Carmina_Piranha wrote: »

spendless they look like the headlice in the first pic on your link.

my mum commented on the fact that he's only ever had big ones and we've never seen a single egg on him so she reckons they're coming onto him when they're big and i'm catching them straight away.

as for them jumping, both my mum and husband say i need new glasses :rolleyes: and perhaps i was shaking them off the tissue because they make me shudder? eldest said he only saw them crawling around on the tissue, he didn't see any jumping.

eldest head's quite scabby but that could be from scratching.

sorry if anyone thinks i'm being nasty about these girls, it's not what i meant. they're lovely girls. i was just trying to explain the lack of contact between the girls and my eldest - hence me wondering if they can be transferred by car seats etc.

as for high school kids tasting bad, he's only had them since starting high school.

The only time I have seen lice 'jump' was when I was fiddling around with sons hair and I was brushing it ready to wet his hair. He had on his school jumper still and it must have been staticy and the static in the comb was making it look like they were jumping so your not going mad yet.

My Daughter and youngest son used to get them all the time, but eldest son never used to get them, weird!

I only used the conditioner and comb method. It always worked really well for us we only ever got out the ones that would get on during that day in school, very rarely had eggs.

This link shows you a few less toxic ways to treat them.

Carmina_Piranha_3

we've been out and i haven't caught up yet, but thanks for replies

karensteps i read somewhere today that they look red after a meal (of blood from your head i assume!).

TAG

Can I just dispell what appears to be a myth (on this thread anyway) that your kids don't get nits once they're at high school. WRONG. Yes they can.

I posted on another 'nit' thread recently about DS who's 13 and in Y8. He kept on at me for weeks about his itchy head. Now bearing in mind that DD (5) I knew didn't have any, and that the shampoo DS was using made me itch like mad I put it down to the shampoo. Never in a million years did I think he would have nits. He hadn't had them for years and certainly not since he'd started high school. OMG how wrong I was.

This particular day DD came home from school with yet another 'nit' letter. So that night I checked her hair, which I do as a matter of course anyway. Everytime her hair is washed I also comb and condition. That way you keep ahead of the game. (no pun intended there) I found 2 very differently sized nits, so I knew she could have literally only just got them. DS standing in the bathroom doorway giving it large about 'oh you check her hair but won't do me blah, blah, blah.' So to shut him up I checked his.

Well to say that the nits had well and truly set up camp is an understatement. I spent over an hour combing through his hair with conditioner. Then did it again every 2 days until they had gone. So where did they come from in the first place? I highly suspect his girlfriend at the time. And I also think that the 2 I found in DD's hair came from her brother.

Bear in mind guys that the older kids will have or have friends with siblings at primary school. Not all girls use hair straightners and TBH nits really don't give a monkeys about whose head they sit on. Clean or unclean really makes no difference.

Nits are, sadly, part of school life these days. It doesn't matter how good or bad the area /school is that they go to, or how old they are, or if they are a boy or girl, they will at some point get nits.

Right I'm off now to have a good old scratch.