What is the longest it has taken to completely get rid of lice?

[lynn]

I did dd hair weeks ago but panicked the next morning when I saw live lice and decided to try olive oil and every day combing.  I washed everything I could, put everything in bags, put boiling water on all combs and clips I used, put all towels she used in dryer/wash in hot water/dryer, vacuumed couch car etc.  I thought we had it done and 8 days later more activity on day 9 I got nix followed directions precisely combed everyday we could   7 days later activity (this was last Sunday) now day 5 I find 4 live lice.  DH wants me to cut her hair but I don't want to mess it up and I don't want to bring her to a hair cut place kwim.   I will keep combing but what am I missing, has anyone else taken this long to get rid of lice?  Is it normal to keep finding live lice?  We get several nits each night.   I am so frustrated.  ideas?

[nd293]

With dd they are getting passed around at school, I think, as she is feeling itchy and finding lice every 6 or so weeks. She says her head is itchy (again) tonight and we're trying the Cetaphil treatment this time. This is our third infestation in 15 weeks, I think.

 

Are you sure someone else is not infested (is that the right word? sounds grim!) and passing it back to your dd? I didn't do any treatment of anything other than hair, apart from hairbrush and the clips we used when combing conditioner through, and we seemed to get rid of them within the 10 day daily combing period (and we didn't comb every day). I was very thorough about getting the nits, though. I found oil much better for this than conditioner, and I cut off each individual hair that had a bit attached.

 

Good luck...

 

(Edited because I hit post too early on my phone)

[catz]

Do you have a high quality metal lice comb?  Are you combing on a schedule?  Here is a pretty aggressive combing schedule to eliminate lice that relies on no chemicals. 

 

http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/theliceprogram/

 

There are good videos on youtube on combing technique as well.

 

The thing about nix or rid (or smothering with oils, etc), is that will kill the live lice.  But it will not kill the eggs.  That's why you need to keep at it for so long. 

 

ETA - good point about re-infection again.  Do you know where she originally got it?

[ChemMommy]

Eggs aren't killed by Rid or Nix. So, you need to retreat in about 7 days to kill newly hatched lice.  And probably 7 days after that if you have thick hair.  I'm lousy (no pun intended) on finding nits on blonde hair.  Also, is anyone else infected?  We passed them around a lot before we killed them.

 

Not to frighten you, but we fought the battle for 6 months before 4 women with long hair stopped passing them around.  Also, some lice are resistant to Rid/Nix.  Are you treating your sofa?  We found that our sofa was contaminated and one chair.  You can go to the hardware store and get a  bedbugs spray for sofas and other hard to launder things.  It was MUCH cheaper than the Rid spray from the drugstore.

 

I HATE LICE!

[AMJ]

We had a re-exposure about a month after our first round. The second time around it took a good 3 weeks of shampooing with the lice shampoo (after several days of treatments) to get clear and stay clear. During this time I also kept the rooms emptied and cleaned all rooms, carpet, furniture maniacally every couple of days. Stuffed things were quarantined behind a locked door or out in the garage (sealed in bags) for more than a month past the point I declared our heads clear.

[LostSurprise]

7 months. It would pop up every 3-4 weeks. 

 

What I learned from situation? Use a suffocation method, pick, treat bedding and repeat every weekend for the next 3 weeks. Don't assume it goes away, kill bugs every week and treat until the last cycle of eggs is hatched and killed. 

 

It's easier to treat it as if you missed something then allow it to build back up. 

[umsami]

The worse time it took probably 3-4 months.  We ended up shaving some heads (boys), cutting some hair short, and retreating and combing a lot.  Fairytales comb, a similar Fairytales like mousse stuff…. I bought readers so that I could magnify what I was seeing and used a headlamp.  It was total pain.

[AlmiraGulch]

When mine had it, it took me all summer to get rid of it.  It was awful.  Combing for HOURS, every day.  I swear I wanted to shave her bald and be done with it!

 

I finally called a professional lice treater person.  She came to our house, went through DD's hair with a fine-toothed comb (literally!), and examined every strand of hair.   She's a hair stylist, too, so she is better skilled at separating and going through each piece of hair.  If it came back, she would come back out and retreat, but it never did.  

 

My only regret is that I didn't call her sooner.  It was the beset $80 I've ever spent.

 

When DSD contracted lice last spring, I called this woman first.  The lice was gone that night, never to return.

[umsami]

Yes, I found out about the professionals after we went through lice hell.  Thing is, we paid more on so many bottles of useless Nix and stuff that the professional would have been cheaper.

 

There are also Rx treatments that are far more effective than Nix.  You can ask your pediatrician about them if this continues to be an issue, but be sure to check your insurance coverage first.

[Heather in Neverland]

When we had foster kids who came to us with horrible lice it took several months until we finally used this: http://www.amazon.com/LiceGuard-Robi-Comb-Electronic-Lice/dp/B000P6TF8W

 

It's the only thing that worked for us. Good luck. I hate lice, too.

[AlmiraGulch]

When we had foster kids who came to us with horrible lice it took several months until we finally used this: http://www.amazon.com/LiceGuard-Robi-Comb-Electronic-Lice/dp/B000P6TF8W

 

It's the only thing that worked for us. Good luck. I hate lice, too.

 

I bought that same comb.  It zapped the live ones but did nothing for the eggs.  Maybe  I wasn't doing it right.

[gingersmom]

It took us about 6 months to get rid of them. Cutting hair super short (boy so it was easier), olive oil, over the counter stuff, paying a professional, bagging everything, did not work.

 

Two treatments with cetaphil and they were gone.

[myfunnybunch]

We went a few months, but it was because my dd was getting reinfected at school. We'd finally gotten rid of them when she had two weeks of summer school and they came back! Aaauuuugggh!

 

Here's what we finally did with her, and with my boys when they got head lice more recently:

 

Told the families they spent a lot of time with. It was really hard, but if it has spread, you risk getting head lice again from someone who doesn't know they've got them. We knew to check my boys last time because someone was honest about their head lice, and we got an email from their dojo. Because of that, I caught it early in my boys (one had a head full of eggs and a few nymphs; the others were only lightly infected) and was able to get rid of it fairly easily.

 

Stripped all the beds and vacuumed the furniture. Put combs and brushes in the dishwasher, stuffies in the freezer. Washed bedding in hot water.

 

We combed through the entire family's hair with a good metal lice comb using a silicone gel called dimeticone. You can buy it as a lice treatment, but it's super expensive. Dh found a giant bottle online for a fraction of the price. It used to be touted as a pesticide-free lice killer, but does not kill lice well enough for them to claim that. (It possibly suffocates some of the eggs and lice.) However, it is so thick and sticky that they cannot move, and is clear so that you can see what you're combing. When my dd with her long hair had head lice, it could take me 2 hours to comb through her hair; my boys 45 min.-1 hour. I went around the head once, then all around again, then re-combed any spots that had signs of lice on the second round until I wasn't finding anything.

 

After washing hair (a few times, as it's sticky) and letting it dry, we used an over-the-counter pesticide treatment on anyone with signs of head lice, and I re-combed.

 

Head checks every day. I never found anything, but I checked diligently. We also changed bedding daily the first 2-3 days even if there was no sign of lice.

 

Re-treatment with the otc shampoo as recommended on the label, and re-comb.

 

Head checks daily for a week, then every 2-4 days for another 2 weeks or until I stopped feeling squicked out.

 

Cat

[Catherine]

Avoid them chemicals-they don't work for eggs (meaning-you still have to comb) and some are resistant anyway. Smother the lives ones with oil or mayo then comb, comb comb until you think you are losing your mind. I washed bedding but nothing more beyond that is really needed, unless you have headrests that you think are contaminated. I didn't do anything to ours and it was fine. Thank goodness when we had this years ago, both kids had short hair!! I cannot IMAGINE dealing with combing a child with long hair for weeks. I'm sure we'd both be ready to kill each other by the time it was over.

[Starr]

google the cetaphil treatment. It's non toxic and well recommended from folks here on the board in past years.

[ljpisme]

When mine had it, it took me all summer to get rid of it.  It was awful.  Combing for HOURS, every day.  I swear I wanted to shave her bald and be done with it!

 

I finally called a professional lice treater person.  She came to our house, went through DD's hair with a fine-toothed comb (literally!), and examined every strand of hair.   She's a hair stylist, too, so she is better skilled at separating and going through each piece of hair.  If it came back, she would come back out and retreat, but it never did.  

 

My only regret is that I didn't call her sooner.  It was the beset $80 I've ever spent.

 

When DSD contracted lice last spring, I called this woman first.  The lice was gone that night, never to return.

 

Yes! I highly recommend getting a professional to help if possible.  We found a service that is safe, 99% + effective and takes about an hour. They use a large "hair dryer" type device that kills live lice and dries out the eggs.  No chemicals.  They will also check every member of your family to determine who else (might) need to be treated.  Not sure if they have any in your area, but I can't recommend them enough.

 

They are pricey, but will save you so much time and frustration.  We had lice last year for several months, and this service finally got rid of them for us.  We got it again 6 months later and didn't even bother with over the counter treatments - we went right there and one visit was all it took.

 

If that isn't an option, I would recommend a top quality nit comb with daily combing  Nix didn't work very well for us at all (even at killing the live lice).

 

Good luck!  Lice are the pits.

[umsami]

We did the Cetaphil thing the most recent time.  Bought the Cetaphil at Sam's.  Key is to remove as much as possible before you blow-dry…and then really dry it well.

 

I still combed like crazy with my Fairytales comb though…before….and in between both Cetaphil applications.

 

It's actually been studied and written up in a medical journal.  

[justasque]

Another thing no one has mentioned yet is to cover the hair for prevention.  When around friends who are fighting lice or have recently been exposed, we braid our hair, pin it up, and tie a scarf or bandanna around the head, covering all of the hair.  That way, we are much less likely to pick it up, and if we have unknowingly already picked it up we are much less likely to pass it on.  I am surprised this simple strategy isn't used more often when lice are being passed around in co-op or school situations.

[redsquirrel]

We got rid of lice in 4 days. I kept combing daily for 8 days, but I didn't find any nits or lice after day 4. And all four of us had it. I didn't use any poison.  I only used an excellent lice comb (Licemeister) and Johnsons baby spray detangler.

 

When I finally figured it out, my youngest son was completely infested. The first time I combed his hair he had hundreds of nits and well over 200 live lice on his head. Everyone had it, but he had it the worst. And in 4 days we had nothing.

 

Daily wet combing with a good comb, clean towels every day, putting pillows in the drier every day. But, really it was the wet combing.

[Momofeat]

Another thing no one has mentioned yet is to cover the hair for prevention.  When around friends who are fighting lice or have recently been exposed, we braid our hair, pin it up, and tie a scarf or bandanna around the head, covering all of the hair.  That way, we are much less likely to pick it up, and if we have unknowingly already picked it up we are much less likely to pass it on.  I am surprised this simple strategy isn't used more often when lice are being passed around in co-op or school situations.

 

I'm so glad you brought this up! There is a little girl who comes to our house for help with math twice a week, and they've been dealing with lice. She hasn't been back since they found it, but she should be coming next week. I understand that they could think she's clear but then find more a few days later, so I'm thinking about prevention.

[KidsHappen]

4 girls with very long hair took 9 months. I tried every method under the sun and the only thing that worked was combing and picking every day until they were finally all gone. Most of our days were taking up with hair care. Luckily it was summer. We have never got them again because I am absolutely paranoid about them.

[Susan in TX]

It is possible that she is getting re-infected. Don't bother with the Nix. Just keep combing, every other day until you don't get any more nits. Then once a week for two weeks. If you find more nits go back to the every other day combing. We used Lice Free Spray. It made the hair easier to comb and it is supposed to kill lice and, more important, the eggs.

 

Susan in TX

[Penny_P]

3 terrible months. Don't bother with Nix.

TLC was what finally rid it for us:

 

http://www.totallicecontrol.com/order-tlc-shampoo.html

 

It's a little pricey, but worth it.