On the Wednesday after returning from my trip to Jamaica (maybe now you will understand what took me so long to post about the trip), I took the kids to their Summer Rec program before work, just like I do every single other weekday during the summer.  As we were walking out to the playground I noticed one of the teachers checking one of the kid’s heads and immediately asked… “What are you checking for?” and he replied “just doing a random lice check” like it was no big deal.  I thought to myself… “Oh, well that’s cool, I am glad they are doing that!”  At 10:00am that same day, I received a call at work that Kaiden had lice and I needed to come pick her up.  After talking to the person on the phone and telling them what I had seen that morning, I got a little more info out of her about the situation.  Apparently several kids had been sent home on Monday with lice.  On Tuesday eight more were sent home with it.  By Wednesday (the day they called me) thirty kids were quarantined in a room and all had lice.  I WAS F*CKING PISSED!

I got there to pick up Kaiden and was told they found no live lice in her hair, but did find eggs.  I got her and Ashton and stopped by the main office and WENT OFF.  Why in the HELL were parents not notified that kids had already been sent home with it?  On Monday when several kids went home… notes should have been posted.  On Tuesday when it was worse… notes should have gone home in lunchboxes or handed directly to parents at pickup.  They sell Lice Guard products to prevent lice infestation when there are outbreaks, which I would have gotten.  OR I would have chosen to keep my kids home with my dad.  Kaiden’s hair could have been braided up and sprayed down.  SOMETHING could have been done had I known there was an issue at the school!!!

We got home and I treated all three of us and spent HOURS combing through our hair with a lice comb (finding NOTHING - but I soldiered on as if I had).  I stripped every single bed and washed everything we owned in hot water.  What could not be washed (throw pillows, stuffed animals, etc) was bagged up tight for two weeks to suffocate and starve the bastards.  All furniture was sprayed down with lice spray, everything was vacuumed.  I was seriously declaring war on those disgusting things.  For the next few days, I was checking her constantly and Ashton too and they were clean… clean until 9:00pm the night before their very first day of school when I found a teeny tiny baby one that had just hatched in Kaiden’s hair.  I lost it.  I was in tears as I loaded both my kids up in the car and headed to a drug store to by MORE lice treatment.  Poor kids did not get to sleep until almost midnight that night and had to get up for first day of school the next morning.  It was that morning that I decided I would treat and comb all of us every single day if I had too.  I called our Pediatrician and asked her to call me in a prescription for the strong stuff, which was AWFUL - it was like pouring a mixture of ammonia and cat piss all over your head.  It smelled so disgusting and you had to leave it in for 8 to 12 hours before washing it out, not to mention it was EXTREMELY FLAMMABLE - like do not even use a hair dryer or you will go up into flames flammable!

We spent two weeks treating ourselves (through tears every time I had to do it).  Using towels only once and then washing them in hot water.  Washing sheets.  Boiling brushes and hair ties daily.  I was doing laundry like I operated a 24 hour laundromat out of my house… it was ridiculous!!!  We never did see anything else after the one I found the night before their first day of school.  Their daycare bombed the building and steam-cleaned the carpets and brought in a RN to catch kids on the way in first thing in the mornings every day to do thorough checks - anyone found with lice/eggs was/is immediately quarantined and sent home.  Kaiden and Ashton have checked out okay every time.  I have finally un-bagged everything and we have gotten back to normal for the most part.  It was the most nerve-racking two weeks EVER!  What kills me is the amount of kids that kept coming back re-infested and had to continue to be sent home… THAT is what sucks… you can do everything in your power to rid your family of it, but you can’t do ANYTHING about the other families that do the bare minimum and keep sending their kids back to re-infest your kids.  I PRAY TO ALL THAT IS HOLY that we NEVER have to go through this crap again!

P.S. Now you are all itching after reading this, aren’t you?  That is how I lived for weeks!  IT SUCKS!