BlogHer - Lice happens: The truth behind my haircut - Comments

Stock up on the tea tree oil shampoo

Lisa Stone — Tue, 09 Jan 2007 08:32:09 -0600

I hear you E. I think the comments above already include the best advice I've heard -- words to live, comb and scratch by, seriously. Best of luck with this.

Lisa Stone
BlogHer Co-founder
Surfette

Next time you see me I'll be wearing one of these

Lisa Stone — Tue, 09 Jan 2007 08:30:35 -0600

...great idea. Wonder if I can get my ten-year-old into a pink jacket. It IS his color, whether or not he'll admit it in the "cooties" phase...

Lisa Stone
BlogHer Co-founder
Surfette

Lots a Lice

erickajb — Tue, 09 Jan 2007 02:03:14 -0600

I think it's a shame that the schools don't have stricter policies like they did before.

My sister and I got lice from a friend when we were in middle school about 20 years ago. We had to be lice and egg free when we went back to school. The school was called and the nurse had to check our hair before we were let back into the classroom.

My friend and her 19 months old son got head lice from her sister's kids about 2 months ago. Her sister's 4 kids have been coming home with lice off and on for over 2 years now.

The schools around my area changed the policy and kids can go back to school with eggs but as long as they don't have any lice bugs. I guess the school board didn't take into consideration that eggs hatch and the solution kills all bugs but not all eggs. It only takes one and the process starts all over again.

It makes me nervous just thinking about sending my son to school in a few years.

my aunt

Mistress Of The Dorkness — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 21:52:36 -0600

my aunt is a proud mother of 4. three boys first. ~getting out the clippers and shaving some heads~ and then along came a little blonde-haired beauty. :-/ can't exactly shave her head. my aunt was understandably distrustful of the coat closets in the schoolrooms where everyone's jackets are crammed in there together. she picked up my cousin a cute little pink jacket that, when you pulled on a string, rolled up into a cool little carrying ball/case/thing... it amused my cousin so much, she's roll up her coat and it would fit nicely in her cubby... I think it helped.

Melanie Perry
*not all who wander are lost*
my blog

The "Lice-y J"?? Eeek!

Lisa Stone — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 11:50:58 -0600

Leslie, I am sitting in a cafe, wiping away tears. Laughter, that is. How fantastic that all you girl scouts were in the same condition -- cameraderie in a time of need. I think that's exactly what the scenario calls for.

Thank you for the tips--I hadn't even thought about the risks of coat closets and curtains. I will definitely invest in a few metal pet combs. The next step? A Sinead 'do for us all...

Happy New Year -- and thanks again for the giggle.

Lisa Stone
BlogHer Co-founder
Surfette

Lisa, I've been admiring

Leslie Madsen Brooks — Sat, 06 Jan 2007 10:44:55 -0600

Lisa, I've been admiring your haircut without realizing the reason for it. . . Eeeeeeeek!

As a child, I was a Girl Scout and a frequent guest and host of sleepovers. You know the sleepover connection, but what a lot of people don't think about is when you send your kinds to camp, they're sharing riding helmets and fencing helmets and and and. . . My Girl Scout troop used to go to a ranch called "Lazy J" that we renamed "Licey J" after 20 of us came back with lice. Yay.

I had lice ELEVEN times before high school. (I also once caught fleas from my sister, who had let our kitten sleep in her hair.) My poor mother!

Anyway, some tips on avoiding lice: Have your kids hang their jackets and backpacks on the backs of their desk chairs instead of in a common coat closet. No sleepovers unless everyone's been checked for lice. Beware tall bus and airplane seats. Check your kids' hair frequently, and act at the first sign of infestation. Request that the school nurse, if there is one, check all kids' hair regularly. When I was in elementary school, the nurse came directly to the classroom a few times a year and used a pair of tongue depressors (a fresh pair for each kid's head) to plow through our locks.

When the inevitable childhood infestation happens, use a metal pet flea comb--they're a PITA (and painful!) but the best at removing lice eggs. Be sure to wash curtains, too, especially in bedrooms. Don't forget to launder the bedskirts, any pet linens, tote bags, and backpacks. Quarantine plush and fabric toys in plastic bags in the garage for at least a month, and launder those that can be washed.

I don't know what the situation is like today, but when I was a kid, the OTC lice shampoos didn't work particularly well. We used a prescription kind called Kwell--we probably had a standing prescription at the local pharmacy.

Ah, the memories. . . As I'm about to put my son in daycare a few times a week, I guess I should stock up on supplies.

Good luck avoiding future infestations!

Leslie

BlogHer Contributing Editor, Research and Academia
Proprietor, The Clutter Museum

Melaleuca is teatree oil

Donasarah — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 14:08:50 -0600

God is Love http://newfreshcreatedjustforyou.blogspot.com/
If anyone wants to get a membership with a teatree oil company to use shampoos on a constant basis and launder liquid with the teatree oil in it for prevention, Just contact me with teatree oil in the subject line..Very glad to help you all out.Bless your dear hearts.

Chiggers

SarahPlainandTall — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 15:47:17 -0600

This was a great blog entry- your haircut looks beautiful! I remember an angry letter in the local paper from a mom whose child shared a locker with another. Apparently she was not told about the other child's lice because it was a "privacy issue" she was furious and her letter was such a ballsy move in our small town community- to say- YES OUR FAMILY HAS LICE and we got it because the school is hiding important public health information from us in the name of "privacy" What the heck!?

Kristine- Are you sure they are chiggers? Usually that's a summertime thing... and I've never heard of chiggers being catchy from person to person/ dog to person... only grass to person. A chigger seems to be a part of the local lore of the midwest- and I had never heard of them till I was preparing to move here. I was arranging to ship a horse to Kentucky to a boarding farm. I had not yet met the owner, but on the telephone she told me her horse had recently picked up some "Turkey Mites" in Missouri and it had caused his legs to swell. When I didn't know what a turkey mite was, she told me they were like Chiggers. I sure felt like a city girl to confess that I didn't know what a chigger was either.

Here is what I *think* I know about them... a chigger is a microscopic little larvae that burrows under your skin and itches like the dickens. They prefer to go to the hottest tightest places on your body- mainly- under your watch band, under your belt, under your underwear elastic. I don't know how they get into your skin- if they are live when they got on you or if they are an egg which hatches- but they say that the worst times of day to pick them up are the hours of dewey grass in the AM and PM. Hay farmers will attest to this. It seems very much linked to grass.

There is a creme called "Chigger-rid" that works all right to kill itch (I think it kills any itch. The favorite remedy though is just a thick dot of clear nail polish on the skin - allegedly to deprive the bug of air and it will die. Ugh... dead microscopic bug under your skin... that's the stuff obsessive compulsions are made of!

I think if your pup has something mysteriously itchy going on that it would be best to just go to the vet and get a skin scraping done- because it could be some sort of mange mite and that's no fun.

The Front Porch Swing

lice + other mites

kristine — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 08:54:33 -0600

Does anyone have a good link to information about lice and mites? I've searched online and read all that is available, and I still feel a bit ill-informed, in particular with Chiggers. Yes, chiggers. We have a chiggers problem with our puppies and now me.

Thanks.

GrenadeFishing.com

About Lice

Shelley2006 — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 00:27:54 -0600

I know, I probably should have taken the time to check all of the comments to see if any one mentioned this, but it's late, and I wanted to get this in before I fall asleep at the keyboard:)!! Last year my children came home with lice. I panicked! I freaked! I blamed every child that they had played with in the last 30 days. Once I gained some minute control over my emotions, we went shopping at Wal-Mart. I bought the usual (and not so reliable anymore) lice shampoo and combs. Did all the washing, all the vacuuming, all the praying, and all the nervous breakdown moderus operandi, lol. I did some research online and found the Lice RobiComb. It was available at Wal-Mart. It cost about $25.00, uses 1 AA battery and is a God Send. The kids didn't like it much because it pulls a little and if you get too close to their ears it's a little irritating, but in about 2 weeks, the lice was gone! I don't mean to sound like a commercial for RobiCombs but ladies this thing is AWESOME!

well out here in the part of

suemamma — Sat, 18 Nov 2006 08:12:15 -0600

well out here in the part of India that I live, there is a very good oil which gets rid of lice and keeps out fresh infestations. For nits, if you wait a week and then reapply the oil, it cleans out your head completely. It's some sort of Ayurvedic preparation. Incidentally, I thought head lice only existed in warm humid climates! Wish I could send out some oil for all of you there.

Egads... the horrible memories...

Valbee — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 23:18:59 -0600

I never had it when I was a kid, but I vividly recall when my boys were in kindergarten, there was an outbreak going on at their school. Some of the mothers in our neighborhood were just horrible to the couple of kids that got it. One of them was checking the head of another child at the bus stop. That child went home and told his mother and all hell broke loose, threatened lawsuits for touching the kid... oh my, it was ugly.

(This is the single largest reason why I wish there had been mommybloggers when my kids were small - because everyone around me was INSANE!)

But our only infestation with lice was several years later. My boys and I were living about 100 miles from home for the first time in our lives and they were frequently heading back to my sister's house on weekends. They got it from my nieces and gave it to me. We weren't positive what it was until my sister called me at work and confirmed it. And this is the best part: I went into my supervisor's office and told her I needed to go home and why. She made me use vacation time because I wasn't "sick."

I'm sorry to say that I was tempted to walk across the room and rub my head up against hers. Sick, no. Contagious? Hell, yes.

We actually didn't have a difficult time getting rid of it, maybe because they weren't continually exposed to where it was coming from. But I did shave their heads and cut about six inches of my own hair.

I Think About

carpets?

Mistress Of The Dorkness — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 19:11:18 -0600

holy cow. you just don't picture carpets in schools and things. am happy to have wooden floors to avoid that sort of thing.
~clucks tongue at cost cutting~ Hope they get it under control for the sake of all those poor kids and parents.

Melanie Perry
*not all who wander are lost*
Mistress of the Dorkness

Only if you come out here, Lisa

The Journal Blogger — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 17:10:19 -0600

Actually, with that cute haircut, you'd be a breeze after darling daughter.

(Hmmm ... an idea percolates in my entrepreneurial brain ... professional nit-picking ...

Nah. I like what I'm doing now better.)

Post-flood, I only have one thing to say:
No. Furnace. In. November. In. Upstate. New. York.

Cheers!
Dawn

Dawn Rivers Baker writes The Journal Blog
- where business and politics meet the mind of a wise-ass

Dawn, will you please be my mom next time this happens?

Lisa Stone — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 14:58:09 -0600

That, ma'am, is maternal commitment. Bravo! And look at her beautiful hair...

How is it going with you all post-flood?

Lisa Stone
BlogHer Co-founder
Surfette

Lice happens: The truth behind my haircut

Lisa Stone — Wed, 15 Nov 2006 17:35:55 -0600

Photo credit: Christopher Carfi

Hi everyone,

See this photo? Me in a typical position at work: Talking. With another blogger (Amanda Congdon! Don't miss her phoenix-rising-from-the-ashes-so-take-that-you-naysayers news).

Only one thing's different: I'm missing a foot of hair. Wondering why? Did I get engaged like Mir? Did I do something nice for another human being?

Not even.

The truth behind my makeover lies in the photo: See how my hands are stuffed into my pockets? Hint: I'm trying not to scratch my head. Because this fall, thanks to a little six-legged infestation of Mrs. M_____'s Fifth Grade class, my ten-year-old and I got lice.

Go ahead, scream with me now...liiiiiiiiiiiiiice. What a nightmare. Imagine the response we Brady Bunch-ers got when we suggested to our ex-spouses that they might want to check their babies for cooties too.

I'm the most popular ex-wife, stepmom-type ever.

And guess what? Turns out we are the last family to catch it. Lice are the school's dirty little secret. When I tore into the drug store next to the school, I couldn't put my hands on a single bottle of de-lousing shampoo. NOT ONE.

"Ma'am, everyone has it," the pharmacist shrugged. I called the other moms of the boys in my son's posse to confess that their babies might have been exposed over the weekend. Guess what? Not news. "Oh yeah, sure, the plague that won't go away..." one mom joked before her voice trailed off into my stony silence. Did she not remember the umpteen spend-the-nights my son had there in the past months, when she didn't bother to share that crawly fact with moi?

In full crusade mode, I even called the principle's office, offering to check the heads of kids as they walked into school. "Every student?" gasped the school secretary, likely aghast at the prospect of hundreds of freaked-out parents instead of a single, freaked-out, fifth-grade mother. "Oh no..." My word, I thought when I (hung up the phone and) stopped swearing; THIS is why we as a species haven't effectively dealt with HIV infection and sexually transmitted diseases -- we can't even bring ourselves to admit to each other when we have head lice?

But you, my friends, are different. Only moms online are telling it like it is. Thank you - because you all saved me. Here's some proof: In Head lice 2: Electric Boogaloo, Julie nails it:

"The pestilence has returned....

"I asked Demi the Younger if her friend G., whom we determined to have been the original source of our infestation, was still a carrier. Ms. Younger didnâ€™t know, but did say that G. is a â€œhugger.â€

â€œGack!â€ I said. â€œNo hugging! Tell her youâ€™ll be happy to shake hands but that there will be NOOOO HUGGING. For cripe's sake, keep your head the HELL away from that girl!â€

Laughing? You won't if your little angel(s) has it, observed Jenn Satterwhite in her August post about Ayun Halliday's new book. Jenn was doubtless remembering her own experience: Lice. The four letter word that makes mommy drink:

"I raced from room to room with my vacuum cleaner screeching â€œDIE you horrible spawn of the worst kind of evil. DIE! DIE!â€ Stuffed animals got whipped into bags. Hair accessories got zip-locked and hurled into the garage. My daughter, slightly worried about her insane Mom was just waiting for me to come after her with combs and chemicals and gas masks. After calming down a bit, I convinced my daughter I would not hurl her into the garage, but would rather turn her into an Italian head pop. I poured Olive oil on her hair. Enough to keep 20 Italian restaurants in business for a year. Pour. Cry. Pour. Cry. Pour. DIE you little vermin shits! My daughter just giggled."

How bad are lice? So bad, in fact, that I see blog-readers offer lice as a call-yourself-lucky-girlfriend scenario -- even in the face of communicable diseases of the blood and eyes! Check this out:When CityMama blogged baby Wallie's painful conjunctivitis, she got this cold comfort from one reader: "Just keep telling yourself, "It could be worse -- it could be head lice.' "

Last Christmas, when Grace's daughter came down with mononucleosis and a side of hepatitis, one reader compared these blood diseases with...lice. "I hope she feels better soon," wrote Angela. "About three years ago we had a lice christmas....All 5 of us thanks to some child in my kids school :( Imagine us all sitting there itching missing the family christmas party! No fun!"

Still giggling? I feel more like crying myself...and its not just because I still have Eau de Clorox under my nails, as Blogger Mary Tsao knows. Go read her heart-breaking story, Why my nickname in fourth grade was bald eagle. Not only was Mary in agony before she was diagnosed with lice, but she suffered terribly at school afterward. Poor little thing.

My son definitely didn't want it to get around that he had...cooties. So I called his teacher, a note went out to his classmates and I called all his homies but...I didn't shave his head. I definitely planned to shave my own, but when I asked the friend who cuts my hair, she talked me out of it. Gorgeous and Beijing-trendy, she looked at me with the eyes of an older sister who's been asked to buy tequila and condoms when I suggested she give me an Annie Lennox look. "NO," she smiled. "Come back next week and we talk."

So, instead, she sheared rather than buzzed me. And by the time this picture was taken, I had washed and combed my hair and my son's with enough chemical nastiness to cause a third foot to grow out of our foreheads. Because getting rid of these little crawly nightmares was hell. HELL. I can confirm that my son's a much better patient than I, that he was nitcombed within an inch of his life while I bitched and moaned every second of the day.

My nails still peel down to the quick from the bleach I used to disinfect and change the bedclothes daily for weeks. And woe betide anyone who brings a hat into my house or touches a hair on my five-foot baby's head. I nearly had a heart attack recently when Ten-Year-Old was sparring with another child in a martial-arts class. The other child chopped and connected with Ten's head. I didn't know which boy to tackle and douse in rubbing alcohol first. While Ten wobbled, I hissed, "Can't you DUCK!? He touched your hair

..."

The upshot: Haircuts are good. Lice are not. And hell, yes, online friendships are real.

You are all invited over for a playdate. Rest assured, it's safe - I still comb out my son's and my hair once a week, just to be sure. When we see the clean comb, we yell and dance around the bathroom like insane druids.

And then....we scratch.

Best,
Lisa

P.S. Do you have a lice or other critter story that I missed? Please add it in the comments section of this online newsletter. I predict 1,000 years of good karma for helping the next parent whose friends are turning a blind, scratchy eye to the problem.

P.P. S. Thank you, all of you who sent the turkey recipes and ideas! I keep looking at the bird and wishing one of you would magically appear to put your hand down its...throat....more next week.