BellaOnline Forums Beauty and Self Hair Lice epidemic

School is in session. That means there will be kids coming home with lice. I did some studying about it.

Head Lice - What are they?

(Just reading about them made my head itch! <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> )

oh, I'm glad my daughter isn't little any more. She had such a problem with them when she was in grade school. I forget what grade it was but she got them twice. I itch just thinking about it.
They are such a pain to get rid of. Treat the hair and wash all the bedding and stuffed animlas, etc.
If anyone needs any advice on ways to get rid of them other than the shampoos they sell in the stores, pm me. I tried a few different things LOL

I am currently working on an article on aternative treatments. It will soon be linked to the two articles that are up now.

I pm'd you.

My son brought home a note the second week of school about lice. My head hasn't stop itching. I had lice in high school. I had really long hear and couldn't not get rid of them. I had to cut a lot of my hair off.

Yikes, I hate it when people have to cut their hair off in order to get rid of lice! But it's sure better than living with them!

Post deleted by ErikaLynSmith

This is probably cheating and abviously not recomended for children, but I have very long thick hair and my daughter brought home lice from school and gave it to me. (Thanks honey) I tried for 3 months with all the different varieties of medicated shampoo and the thing that finally got rid of them was $15 worth of home hair coloring. The hair dye fried all of them and I haven't had a problem since.

I would agree that cutting a little girls hair to get rid of them is never a good thing, but I think it is rude to sat that " it is the easy way out." I never cut my daughter's hair but I understand how frustrating it can be to try to remove EVERY single egg form long hair. A parent can get the feeling that it is impossible. Schools acn not allow a child back into school if they have just one egg left in their hair, so how much school does a child miss due to lice becomes a problem too.
I just thought it was rude for you to make the comment the parent is just lazy if they have worked on getting eggs out and they are having a hard time so they decide to cut some of the long hair off. I hope I didn't offend anyone, I just wanted to make a point

If my reply sounded rude it was most likely b/c I edited my original reply. If you were able to have read my original reply in it's entirety it would most likeyl not have sounded rude. I will simply delete the post and end my part of the discussion here.

Have a nice day. <img src="/images/graemlins/computer.gif" alt="" />

We have just gone through a horrible rash of lice here at my home.

I too, trimmed my daughter's hair, but did so because she was crying when I kept trying to brush through all the length.

I myself am bald right now! <img src="/images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" /> In trying to get of the nits in my hair, it started coming out. I must say that I had a gastric bypass back in January, and I was already losing some of my hair due to my not eating enough protein (most common problem). But between the chemicals and trying to pull the comb through my hair we (my husband was helping me) were just pulling out clumps of hair.

Of course on the bright side, I no longer have hair for lice to get into! <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

My husband also chose to shave bald, my oldest son said he would rather get a relly short haircut (#3 on the top, #1 on the sides) and my youngest said he wanted to look like Daddy. We did not shave Seth completely bald <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />, we just gave him a buzzcut - #2 all over.

All of our hair will grow back - I'm obviously not doing anything so extreme with Jordan - it's just a cute bob right below her neck. But I must say losing all of my hair was a little shocking to begin with. Now I'm used to it and playing the "cool" angle - had some pictures made at Glamour Shots and all. I may start a new fashion statement around here, LOL! <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I cut my hair by choice. I was in high school and it had to go. When you have hair to your waist almost, it is hard to get them all out. We treated everything in my house a number of times. My mom blames it on my loving to try on hats. Hasn't stop me yet!

I know for certain that works. I once had an older client - very fastidious - who would have died if I had told her while I was doing her hair that I saw a couple of lice on her. Fortunately I was applying haircolor and was pretty sure it would kill them. It did. Never saw a sign of them after the hair color.

I would never do that again. As a hairdresser, I am not allowed to work on anyone with lice. I have to stop working and ask them to leave the salon, no matter what state their hair is in when I find the lice.

Wow, that sounds a bit harsh. I can understand that you aren't allowed to work on people's hair when they have lice, but when they are desperate and rely on a hairdresser because they think their knowledge is what makes it worth it, why shouldn't they trust and fall back to you?
My mother did it for me when I had lice once, but when I would have them now, I would rely on a hairdresser myself since they have the knowledge about lots of hair-related stuff...
So sad to see that you just have to tell them they have to leave. It's bad enough already that they feel ashamed of having lice. I think nobody asks for this and wants lice on purpose.
I don't know what to think of this, but it sure sounds harsh!

I'm going to assume that there are some sort of state board laws or health ordinances that require you to not work on those clients because you can infect other people. Not just lice but other things.

I think that if you do have a client like that you would tell them to seek a medical professional. Cosmotology school does teach about all the different disorders and diseases which can help to spot them. But you have to let a medical professional deal with them.

I could be wrong.

It does have to do with State Board regulations. It is contagious and we can't put other clients at risk. We don't just tell them to leave, we tell them that there are products in the drug store to treat the problem. They can also talk to the pharmacist or doctor.

Hairdressers aren't equipped to treat contagious disease or disorders.

An article about natural remedies for head lice has just been added. It is the third in the series linked to the article mentioned above.