Head-lice Hell

I sighed when the note came home the other day. I get these notes A GREAT DEAL. They are usually notifications from the offspring’s school or Mr Small’s daycare . They are usually printed on brightly coloured paper to make sure I can’t miss it when I unpack their bag. It goes something like this:
‘Dear Parent/Guardian,
one of the children at school/daycare was discovered to have lice today. Please check your child’s hair and treat if necessary. A dry scalp check is usually not able to identify them.
Yours sincerely, etc etc’

I go from the anxiety thing of, ‘I hope it wasn’t my child who has head lice’ through to ‘Where’s the conditioner and comb?’

In truth, my kids get head lice frequently. This does not make me a bad parent (at least that’s what I tell myself) I also read this study that made me feel a tad less upset about it where it said: ‘Head lice do not discriminate on the basis of age, gender, race or social class. Head lice are not concerned with hair type, colour or hygiene status.’

It just means that I have to be super vigilant because they are really prone to catching the little blighters.

I have run the gamut of treatments. The best way for me though is to have what is known in my house as ‘nit patrol.’ I usually do nit patrol every Friday night. Oh yes, it’s party central at my house ;) and I condition and comb the kids hair before their bath.

I did discover that if you are using a good treatment then all you need to do is put it through and rinse. You don’t need to wet comb afterwards. So while Friday night is purely a preventative exercise, if there is an outbreak I am saved the added hassle of combing through once I’ve treated their hair.

The biggest problem I think is that while I try to keep on top of head lice at home many parents don’t. or they don’t know their kids have it. So while I can break the cycle sometimes, they inevitably come back. So nit patrol is destined to be a key event in our home for some time to come.

How do you combat nits?