Headlice

[Barbara]

Have any of you or your children encountered this little critters. One of my girlfriends was going to come over today for lunch but has just cancelled because her daughter has headlice. I remember having them when I was in primary school but have never encountered them since :dk:

[mel35]

I have 4 daughters with long hair and I have battled with head lice for years :argh: My youngest seems to be getting them a fair bit this year from pre school. It doesn't help that she wont leave her elastics in her hair and just lets it go everywhere x(

[nj27au]

I had them when I was really little because there had been a headlice epidemic at primary school...no one was safe!

[alegna]

My son had a really bad lot when he was 18mth old ... Every potion didn't work.

Tea Tree oil watered down seemed to be the thing to keep them away!!

[Pam]

Gosh, I remember years ago when Erin was at primary school, the Lice problems I had! No sooner I'd get Erin's head cleaned up - off she'd go back to school and yup she'd have blasted Lice again! I treated her on and off for a whole year! Just takes one slack parent not to clean their child's head up to keep them going :( Apparently they love nice clean hair too! It was such a costly experience back then, I have no idea what it's like now tho. Maybe the treatments are better too now? Strangly, her brother (she shared a room with him etc) never got them.

[bizzybee]

x( I hate these blasted things x( Makes my head itchy thinking of them. I too heard they like clean hair. :dk: I have long curly hair and my daughters both have shoulder length hair. My youngest had an outbreak at Daycare and we all were treated for them x( The best thing I found was to use the Quillada brand and then comb the nasties out and rub californian poppy hair oil in the hair. Apparently they cannot breathe in the oil. :P :dk: I did this at night and combed the hair with a lice comb and left the oil in the hair and then in the morning washed and conditioned the hair and used a leave in hair conditioner to take away the scent of the lice treatment product. It worked for me :tree:
P.s.... Sorry about the long post girls

[Leigh]

Touch wood, we have not had a problem with this from school. They got it once when they were little from my sister, but as yet we have escaped them at school.

There are kids in their class that are forever infected with them, must be very frustrating for the parents of the kids that keep getting infected by them.

I don't wash their hair during the week, a few other parents I know do the same, unless we really have to. They haven't had problems either, so maybe it helps.

I had also heard you can make a natural replant, that contains lavender, and you just spray it on each morning to ward them off.

They are nasty little things, it's a shame they don't make a spot on replant like that do for dogs and cats, just dab it on the back of their neck :Hehe:

[Barbara]

We do a similar thing Leigh - my boys usually wash their hair each Friday after swimming & we spray water (mixed with a little Tea Tree oil) on their head each morning when brushing their hair. Fingers crossed, we haven't had that problem yet.

[Chrystal]

A mixture of water and brown vinegar (4 to 1) is als good as a repellant. Theres the vinegar, tea tree or lavender and you alternate each week or 2, and thats meant to help keep them at bay.

So far so good here, but I'm forever looking, and just the thoguth makes my head feel itchy (like now).

[capricorn]

Any white coloured conditioner put very thickly onto DRY hair will smother the little beasties x( Leave for 10-15 mins then comb out with fine tooth comb. The reason you use white coloured conditioner is you can see the lice in the conditioner as you comb them out :D

[mel35]

Bizzybee- you have just given me an idea- next time one of my kids has headlice I might try putting olive oil mixed with teatree and lavender oil overnight in their hair and washing out in the morning. I spend an absolute fortune on lice treatments, that quite often don't work, because I always treat everyone if one has them. With most of the treatments that do work I have found they stop working after I have used them a couple of times.

The white conditioner is a good method too and it helps the eggs come out easier, but if you miss just 1 egg you're back to where you started from. x(

Now I'm getting off this thresd coz it's making my head itchy :D

[capricorn]

Thanks Mel I didn't know that about the white conditioner thingy :faint: It's enough of a problem when you or your kids have the little blighters you want to make sure you get every single one of them first time around :D

[MissieK]

My sister had long, thick white-blonde hair growing up & had huge problems with lice.

I can remember once she had heaps of eggs and Mum spent hours combing them out & she missed about 2 weeks of school because the council said that all the eggs had to be gone before she could go back!!! Even though they were all dead. Dad got dressed in his power suit and marched down to the council & demanded they let Jenny go back to school, or they could pay for a tutor to home school :Hehe: That did the trick ;)

I'll remember about the conditioner, etc. Thankfully we haven't had any problems - yet.

Melissa