I confess, today, I wish my blog was strictly a food blog… Or a strictly fashion or photography blog. But alas, I’m committed to improving the health of the whole body and looking for natural solutions to common problems.
(My head feels itchy just thinking about how to write this post.)
It feels somewhat embarrassing, and just a little gross to blog about lice, but I feel compelled–and I’ve been asked, to share this non-toxic, highly-effective solution since lice is a big problem where we live.
I never had lice growing up, nor do I remember knowing anyone who’d had it. But living here in Northern California, just over the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco, my kids have fallen victim to the annoying little critters not once, but three times!! And before you think, she must not keep a tidy home, or she must not wash and comb her kids’ hair, let me share that nearly every family I know here has also experienced the joys of lice at least once. One friend’s child has had it nine times!!
No kids I know living on the East Coast have had it, so I’m guessing it has something to do with the very mild climate we live in, and I’d love to connect it to and blame it on global warming. The coldest it usually gets here is 42F, and it rarely gets hotter than 92F. It must be the perfect environment because there is always a lice “incident” (as our school calls it) in one of the classrooms at our school, every week of the school year. Think about that… that’s nearly 10 months of fearing the little critters will find their way onto your child’s head.
If you or your child should be so (un)fortunate as to get lice, you have just three options, as I see it, for ridding yourself of them. You can pay a “nit picker” to come to your home (very discreetly) and carefully comb through your hair. You can go to a nit picking salon (a booming business in the San Francisco area), since many don’t care about being discreet since the problem is so rampant here. Or you can do it yourself at home with this great product I’ve discovered by LiceMD. Mind you, many people rush out to the pharmacy to buy and later wash or have their hair washed with a shampoo containing pesticides, such as Nix. Please do not waste your time doing this! The pesticides used in lice treatments are known carcinogens, and are the last thing you want to put on your scalp or the scalp of your developing child. They also aren’t effective in killing the eggs, called “nits,” so they usually require multiple treatments.
LiceMD* has a product that is pesticide free and eliminates 100% of lice and their eggs. In reality, a thorough coming with a good quality lice comb will remove 100% of lice and their eggs, but this product helps you by literally suffocating any live lice, and making the eggs easier to comb out (they’re incredibly small and nearly impossible to see). The only ingredient it contains it Dimethicone–a silicon-based polymer commonly used as a lubricant or conditioning agent in many conditioners and hair styling products.
You simply apply the product to the scalp, work it through the hair, wait 10 minutes and then carefully comb through the hair section by section. Since the product is very slippery and viscous, it does require more than one sudsing with shampoo to get completely out.
Please note: LiceMD also manufacturers a product that does contain pesticides, so make sure you get the product shown above.
I always get lazy with this, but I find tea tree oil to be an effective preventative measure. When I’ve heard there’s been an incident, I wet my hands, put a few drops of tea tree essential oil in my palm, and rub my palms together before running them over and through my children’s hair.
Eat Well, Be Well, Live Well 