I love my kids. I love that they go to school and have loads and loads of friends. But, one thing I don't like is all the germs and "critters" they bring home with them from school. Right now I'm suffering from a cold that brings along with it an ache that feels like my joints have been replaced with lead and the only way to get through a day is to take a two-hour nap. This school year has been a doozie for bugs!
I've got two school-aged daughters, both with fairly long hair. The first time the school has EVER called me during a school day this past fall was to tell me that both of my daughters had lice. LICE? What? Not my kids! They are clean...most of the time.
Over the next week, I "nit-picked" and combed through two heads of hair multiple times a day, washed every shred of bedding, clothing, scrubbed heads with lice shampoo and vacuumed mattresses, carpets and car upholstery to ensure those disgusting little creatures were expelled from my daughters' heads. It was the most I've every gagged in a one week period. Ick. But, I was triumphant! (or so I thought...)
About two weeks later, my younger school-aged daughter got into the car dejected and sadder than I normally see her. (She's our melancholy one.) She had been told by the school nurse that she had lice, AGAIN! I just about tore my hair out at that point. But, instead we set up around-the-clock lice checks. I also instituted daily heat blasts from the hair-dryer to burn those lil' buggers out of her scalp. She was surprisingly willing to let me practically scald her with the hair dryer a few times a day to get rid of the lice.
We have been lice free since December 1, 2007. I will say that I'm a lot more anal-retentive about letting my daughters sleep over at their friends' house. We don't share combs or brushes and we wash our bedding A LOT. Right about now I wish I could just wash bedding to make this draining cold go away.
