Head Lice

Recently both my boys had head lice.

The boys have been lucky in the past, where William had gone 6 years without getting them, yet after a new term in James' nursery he has caught them and subsequently passed them on to his brother.

I thought I would take a moment and blog a few facts about them as well as how we dealt with them. As usually at some point your children are going to be in an environment with them or will have them.

Facts.

Head lice, or more commonly known as nits, are tiny insects that live in human hair. They are very small, and at their largest no bigger than a sesame seed. Their colour varies from light brown to dark brown and depending if they have fed sometimes red in colour.

The female lay eggs in sags which stick to the individual hair. A baby head louse hatches between 7 to 10 days later and within a week they too can lay eggs.

They crawl from head to head clipping on to the hair with their claws. But they do not fly or jump and it is very difficult to get them from pillows or towels. (However I will mention this later)

They can be incredibly difficult to detect and often it is not until the child in itching a lot that you can notice there is a problem. Most leaflets will tell you to do 7 -10 day inspections.

My experience.

I didn't notice that the boys had them. I must confess that I don't do weekly inspections; mainly due to time frame always being busy (especially with the boys being under 5) I also worry that I might become obsessed with doing that as I have a tendency to do that. It was only when they were itching that I noticed.

Once I inspected their hair I found quite a few. I would advise you check around the fringe, around the ears and the crown as priority as I found that their higher concentration was there. However please do a full search.

I went to a pharmacy and got a bottle of anti head lice solution. Please ask the pharmacist for advice as some have age restrictions (mine states the its not to be used on under 2s)

Once I put the treatment on as advised I waited the time and ran a thin comb with metal teeth through their hair. This help pick up the dead lice as well as collecting any eggs, as my bought solution seemed to only kill adults.

A few things I would advise though:

Before applying the solution brush your child's hair taking as many knots out as possible. I would repeat this after the treatment and before you use the specifically designed comb. I didn't realise this and tears soon came as I was trying to put it through with knots catching every pull.

Once you've done this wash out and continue to follow the instructions.

I immediately checked their hair again. Just to see if I've missed any.

Repeat throughout every member of the family.

I know in the facts that it says they can't survive on pillows or sheets.  This is true because they need to feed. However it occurred to me that the eggs take 7 to 10 days to hatch and if they were on the pillows or sheets that they could re enter the hair so subsequently I've washed them anyway on a high wash.

I would also suggest to check with 5 days. If eggs are still present you will be looking at another 5 to 7 days for them to hatch again.

My final courtesy is this.  Wherever the child or children caught the lice please inform them. Nothing worse then doing all this hard work and it not actually stopping the problem.

Hope this has helped.