PSA: Head Lice
Public Service Announcement:
For anyone who's come in contact with us in the past week? two weeks? three weeks?
We have now found LIVE LICE on the heads of Elf, Ben, and me. Husband remains to be examined.
Anyone who has been in our home, especially sleeping here; anyone who has hung out with us or used our pillows; anyone who knows us, please reflect on whether you may need to run a fine-toothed comb through your heads, with close attention to the scalp, especially behind the ears and at the nape of the neck.
There is excellent, step-by-step information at The RID Site, which is a product for removing and killing lice. There are multiple sources and Public Health Sites, including the CDC, and any number of others, all of which have excellent information.
Of all the blood-consuming parasitic infestations, I've got to say that head lice have a number of bonuses over others:
-they die quickly without blood
-they are not spread by animals (yay...not cat-shaving or cat-bathing!)
-they cannot survive in freezing temperatures
-they cannot survive in temperatures over 130 degrees F
-they do not live indefinitely in bedding
So...it's SO much better than bed bugs, SO much better than fleas, ticks, etc.
But still...UGH. LOTS of bedding cleaning and throwing out for freezing of the random bedding and pillows and such, washing in hot water of the pillow covers and sheets and hats and such. But this is manageable, if a total PITA.
/PSA
ETA: Our plethora of pillows are outside freezing the little buggers to death. Bedding is downstairs waiting for the HOT water heater to heat back up so we can wash bedding.
All of us have used RID on our hair (my cheekbones under my glasses near my hairline are still stinging slightly) and combed through and scraped the scalp with the cool little metal brush. We are, for now, bug-free. Now to listerine and denorex and metal-comb our hair daily, then use the RID again next Sunday, and we should be bug-and-nit free as nothing will live to hatch and make more nits.
::crosses fingers::
And, hey, silver lining: everything is going to have to be cleaned and vacuumed. How saaaaad. ;-)
For anyone who's come in contact with us in the past week? two weeks? three weeks?
We have now found LIVE LICE on the heads of Elf, Ben, and me. Husband remains to be examined.
Anyone who has been in our home, especially sleeping here; anyone who has hung out with us or used our pillows; anyone who knows us, please reflect on whether you may need to run a fine-toothed comb through your heads, with close attention to the scalp, especially behind the ears and at the nape of the neck.
There is excellent, step-by-step information at The RID Site, which is a product for removing and killing lice. There are multiple sources and Public Health Sites, including the CDC, and any number of others, all of which have excellent information.
Of all the blood-consuming parasitic infestations, I've got to say that head lice have a number of bonuses over others:
-they die quickly without blood
-they are not spread by animals (yay...not cat-shaving or cat-bathing!)
-they cannot survive in freezing temperatures
-they cannot survive in temperatures over 130 degrees F
-they do not live indefinitely in bedding
So...it's SO much better than bed bugs, SO much better than fleas, ticks, etc.
But still...UGH. LOTS of bedding cleaning and throwing out for freezing of the random bedding and pillows and such, washing in hot water of the pillow covers and sheets and hats and such. But this is manageable, if a total PITA.
/PSA
ETA: Our plethora of pillows are outside freezing the little buggers to death. Bedding is downstairs waiting for the HOT water heater to heat back up so we can wash bedding.
All of us have used RID on our hair (my cheekbones under my glasses near my hairline are still stinging slightly) and combed through and scraped the scalp with the cool little metal brush. We are, for now, bug-free. Now to listerine and denorex and metal-comb our hair daily, then use the RID again next Sunday, and we should be bug-and-nit free as nothing will live to hatch and make more nits.
::crosses fingers::
And, hey, silver lining: everything is going to have to be cleaned and vacuumed. How saaaaad. ;-)