Headlice (merged)

aliasojo

Edinburghlass wrote: »

I need to stop reading this thread as the cat has fleas and I ordered Frontline on Saturday and meantime the cat is on the end of my bed

:rotfl:

GET IT OFF THE BED NOW!

Have you forgotten the last conversation we had about fleas and beds?

Poppy9

2girlsforme wrote: »

Sorry ailuro2 but chlorine doesn't kill them, the first time I found them on my daughter she was absolutely riddled with them (had obviously had them for ages and I hadn't noticed) and she had been swimming heaps that week.

Agree. My DD used to swim for 7 hours a week from age 7-11 and with waist long hair there was always a stink of chlorine about it but if she was sitting by a nitty nora in class she would catch nits!

Lunar_Eclipse

Carmina_Piranha wrote: »

the moneysaving aspect of this post is to find out if using hedrin and then using it again a week later is similar to wet combing?

Aren't headlice and nits a pain!

I have no idea how your son is getting them, although I suspect it is from someone/people that he has regular contact with. Personally I believe some children are prone to catching them and others less so. And it has nothing to do with 'attraction to clean hair' - this is a myth to stop social stigma.

Anyhow, my advice is to do two things. Cure and then prevention.

Firstly, cure what is currently in his hair. From experience, I have found this can take 4 weeks. I use the wet combing method. But the trick is to chose any method but follow it through completely. To do this, I would use an excellent comb (nit free's £10 metal one - very fine teeth) on wet cleaned hair laden with conditioner. Tea tree conditioner is an added bonus. Only use the nit comb after brushing/combing with a regular brush to ensure all knots are out. The combing can take quite a while as you need to ensure that all the hair is combed a few times. About 45 minutes the first time as an indication. We do it in the bath and my daughters shower afterwards to avoid re-contamination from the bath water. But as your son is older (but hopefully with shorter hair) he may wish to be dressed but with wet hair.

I do this EVERY day for the first 5 days or so and then alternate days until everything is gone. Most people hand pick the eggs out. They are tiny and very hard to see IMO.

Secondly, once your son is clear, I would use some preventative measure to keep on top of it should he become reinfested. I do the wet combing method every week on my children regardless.

I have read from a website that once children are itchy, they have had the headlice for about 3 months! Not sure I believe it, but once itchy, I have found it takes a good 4-6 weeks of very regular treatment to clear. Six months doesn't seem that unusual, yet writing it sounds absurd, does it not?

It is a very tedious process, but don't give up as they sadly don't go away by themselves. HTH.

TAG

Lunar_Eclipse wrote: »

Aren't headlice and nits a pain!

I have no idea how your son is getting them, although I suspect it is from someone/people that he has regular contact with. Personally I believe some children are prone to catching them and others less so. And it has nothing to do with 'attraction to clean hair' - this is a myth to stop social stigma.

Anyhow, my advice is to do two things. Cure and then prevention.

Firstly, cure what is currently in his hair. From experience, I have found this can take 4 weeks. I use the wet combing method. But the trick is to chose any method but follow it through completely. To do this, I would use an excellent comb (nit free's £10 metal one - very fine teeth) on wet cleaned hair laden with conditioner. Tea tree conditioner is an added bonus. Only use the nit comb after brushing/combing with a regular brush to ensure all knots are out. The combing can take quite a while as you need to ensure that all the hair is combed a few times. About 45 minutes the first time as an indication. We do it in the bath and my daughters shower afterwards to avoid re-contamination from the bath water. But as your son is older (but hopefully with shorter hair) he may wish to be dressed but with wet hair.

I do this EVERY day for the first 5 days or so and then alternate days until everything is gone. Most people hand pick the eggs out. They are tiny and very hard to see IMO.

Secondly, once your son is clear, I would use some preventative measure to keep on top of it should he become reinfested. I do the wet combing method every week on my children regardless.

I have read from a website that once children are itchy, they have had the headlice for about 3 months! Not sure I believe it, but once itchy, I have found it takes a good 4-6 weeks of very regular treatment to clear. Six months doesn't seem that unusual, yet writing it sounds absurd, does it not?

It is a very tedious process, but don't give up as they sadly don't go away by themselves. HTH.

Totally agree with you LE.

As I mentioned in my post, if you do the combing and conditioning as often as you wash your childs hair then it keeps everything under control. If they have caught nits in between hair washes then your nipping it in the bud before things get out of control.

Carmina_Piranha_3

sarahg1969 wrote: »

The worst time was when the younger one had a gymnastics competition. I thought I'd got rid of them, and put her hair up, and secured it with hairspray. They obviously DON'T like hairspray, as they ALL congregated at the front of her head!!!

i've got that picture stuck in my head now :rotfl:

annaangeluk wrote: »

I got my nitty gritty on presciption from the docs.

i considered it, but thought the doc would probably want to see him and it's difficult to get a same-week appointment here anyhow. i bought one today for £9.99 but it's worth mentioning again for anyone else who hasn't bought one yet.

Carmina_Piranha_3

geekgirl wrote: »

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.

well, i may still be going mad but that might have been the case yes.

flower7 wrote: »

If you are worried about your car or pillow cases spray some hairspray on those places aswell.

that's a good idea. he's had a new pillow since the last episode but it might be nitty, he doesn't have asthma so i can spray his pillow, possibly the car :T

Spendless

Carmina_Piranha wrote: »

so much for the hedrin - the only one i found on son's hair tonight was alive and kicking! i'm going to the pharmacy tomorrow, but i think wet combing will be just as effective as chemicals. i'll have a look at nitty gritty combs.

That was exactly the problem I was having with my daughter's hair. Lice still alive after treatment. So I used conditioner and wet combing and ordered the nitty gritty stuff, which arrived the following day and used the lotion on her which found another 2 lice.:eek: .

To get rid of the eggs I found that only the nitty gritty comb or my fingernails worked.

It's either superdrug or super savers chemist that do a cheap tea-tree oil nit repellant spray. It costs around £1.

Violetta_2

Carmina_Piranha wrote: »

that's a good idea. he's had a new pillow since the last episode but it might be nitty, he doesn't have asthma so i can spray his pillow, possibly the car :T

Not 100% sure but I think you can put his pillow in the freezer to kill nits I'm sure I've heard of people do that to their kid's cuddlys to kill off dust mites if they have probs with dust mite allergies, so it may work with pillows for nits?

Butterfliesarepretty

I once caught nits off my daughter. For two weeks while in cyprus on holiday after having my daughter the weekend before I was scratching and my mum could not find anything on my scalp or the hair. When I got home I had a shower and big black nits fell out of my hair. I just used a nit shampoo and the normal comb until they were all gone. Its a horrible experience but you have to keep treating the hair for weeks until you are sure.

Carmina_Piranha_3

the nitty gritty comb seems excellent, it brings out dandruff too lol!


i'm going to keep combing him (and me!) regularly for a while. he's 11 and at high school but i'm still washing his hair when he's in the bath because although he will go and wallow in the bath without being ordered to he never washes his hair unless i tell him to :rolleyes: so i can wet comb him regularly

he said he doesn't want to smell of lavender, so just tea tree spray would be best. i thought his shampoo was tea tree and mint original source, but it's just mint.

i scratch my head every time i read this thread :eek: