Creepy Crawlies

The lice infestation that has several schools in the area sending kids home for a couple of months has finally hit my house. I'd been hoping against hope that we'd be spared. But alas. A part of me is laughing - I think it's funny. I really do. Part of me says no big deal. But most of me wants to go crawl under the covers with a good book and just stay there.

We managed to avoid the first two rounds of kids being sent home, and I've been checking my son's head every night as we watch TV. My sister's children have all had it, and she keeps fighting them off, but each time we think they're clear...

Tonight, as he was itching at the dinner table, I decided to do a more thorough check and did indeed found two nits. No problem, I thought, having experienced this before. Two nits is not so bad. I thought I'd just comb him out tonight, and do a treatment tomorrow with my niece and nephews.

So I walked over to my sisters house up the block and borrowed a lice comb. Went all the way upstairs to get conditioner, and all the way back down to the basement, after gathering all the supplies and a stool. I should have checked the bottle first. It was nearly empty - not nearly enough for his tight curls to be combed pain-free. So go back up two flights to get another bottle - thank goodness I had a spare, but now this is my good stuff, which I'm loathe to waste. Oh well. Lice free is worth it, right? Back to the basement, get him on the stool, water down the conditioner, get it on his head, and off we go.

I stopped counting at 25 nits, and walked back over to my sister's house to get the lice-killing-solution. I still somehow managed to get home and put the stuff on his head. He is now playing video games with a shower cap, so the stuff has time to heat up and kill the little buggers. I hope. And now I'm ready to go into full out compensation mode. But I can't fully, because in 45 minutes, I have to get him in the shower, and then start combing.

Last time we dealt with this, we both had them. It was before I fell ill. I had energy to burn (or so I thought, so I burned it - bully for me). It was no problem to do both our heads in one go. But this time, just from the dinner with the family, checking, combing, walking, and treating, I already feel like I need to lie down.

I will have to find the energy somewhere to do my own head, so I can be sure I don't have any, but I don't know where it will come from, or at what cost.

In the meantime, my sister is kindly coming over this evening to help me change all the sheets, and deal with the pillows, and all the other lovely stuff one has to do when trying to get rid of lice.

And if he still has nits in the morning, I will have to keep him home. School has a no-nit policy, and for good reason. Those things spread like nobody's business, especially in cuddly classrooms. And ours are really cuddly.

I somehow don't think I will make it to my volunteer hours tomorrow at the school. I have a feeling I will be recouping.