I think my son has head lice, but I’m not sure. How do I know what to look for?

Well first of all, remain calm. Your child is not the dirty kid who gave everybody else’s kid head lice, so lets start from there. By now you probably know what head lice are. You know they are tiny bugs that live in the hair and are spread through contact. That said, here is something you probably didnt know: Head lice love clean hair! The cleaner, the better actually. And they really don’t like dirty hair (I can feel you cringing and thinking of how many times your son has begged to skip his nightly bath, now wishing that you had said yes…) I simply tell you this because your son did not get head lice because he is dirty. He got it because someone he knows and was near very recently had it. End of story.

Double and triple checking your son’s head on a regular basis is a pretty good practice during his school aged years. From the time he is enrolled in preschool until at least middle school he will be exposed to it all year long. Lice have no favorable season, although you will notice it spreading through school in waves as one child accidentally hands it right off to another.

Things To Look For:

Keep an eye open first for white or beige specks. These could possibly be nits (lice eggs) and you will be able to tell because they will be attached to the hair strand within 2 inches of the scalp and cannot be removed with your fingers. If you have to use your fingernails and a decent amount of force, its a nit. If it slides right off without any effort, keep looking.

Regardless of whether or not you found any nits in the hair, if you have heard tales of lice being spread through your child’s school continue your search for bugs.

A louse at its largest is smaller than a poppy seed. They are notoriously hard to spot, so get your reading glasses on and prepare yourself for a thorough and timely search. This picture is an extreme closeup of a live louse. I was once handed a live louse by a parent of a client and when I held it in my hand I noticed that I have many freckles much larger than it. I still get the heebie-jeebies just thinking about it!

What To Do If Your Child Has Lice:
Deep breath.

Gather up all of your child’s stuffed animals and put them in a garbage bag. Stuff them in a closet where they will not be taken out for 30 days. You do this because any nits or bugs that may or may not be on each toy will have cycled through life and death without surviving because the bugs need a human (or living animal) to feed on. Any eggs that might hatch during that time will have nothing to feed on and will die within those 30 days.

Any items that can be washed in the washing machine need to go into the wash as soon as possible. This includes sheets, pillows, backpacks, jackets, etc. Really, anything that they come in contact with that is made out of natural fibers. You dont have to worry about plastic toys, etc., because lice are unable to live without a host for more than 24 hours. A louse can survive under water for 40 minutes, so set your machine for the longest, hottest wash setting you have.

Quarantine your child. I mean this in the nicest way possible, but they should not be sitting on your fabric couches, laying in bed, or playing with others until you have begun treatment. I urge you to do this with as much sensitivity to their emotions as possible. I cannot count how many times I have informed a parent that their child may have head lice and the child broke down into tears. It has a bad stigma and is an emotional time (speaking from experience) so be gentle.

Choose a treatment plan. How you go about treating your child for head lice can vary depending on how strongly you feel about exposing them to chemicals and medications. The treatments you will find at drug stores are going to contain pesticides and chemicals that may or may not kill head lice. Historically, head lice are known to build up immunities to chemicals in lice killing treatments, so you may end up treating this issue multiple times for months on end without seeing results. My recommendation is to take the natural approach. This can be done with brands that promote natural heath, such as Lice Killer, which has a four step approach that (i can attest to) completely annihilates all bugs and nits, or through olive oil and tea tree oil treatments.

Most Importantly, you need to be absolutely 100% thorough in combing through your child’s hair. Go to the drug store and buy a lice comb. It will have metal teeth extremely close together. This ensures that anything stuck to the hair is removed. You can completely remove every single nit and bug from your child’s head if you take extremely small partings and comb every hair on their head. The treatments are merely to kill whatever may be in their hair, but you still have to comb them out. This is perhaps the most painstaking part of the entire process.

On that note, I wish you luck. Dont get too down about the whole situation. The vast majority of children will get lice at least once in their life. Adults and baby brothers and sisters are capable of getting it as well, so have someone check your hair just in case. Adult cases are rare, but better safe than sorry.