Once upon a scalp

Tim sent me an Instagram Reel yesterday, one of maybe a handful a day that he sends, and it was about the state of a woman's home and mind after it had been announced at her kids' school that there were some lice cases reported. She hadn't even found any herself!

It made me laugh, and then instantly took me back to fall of 2019. This is something I might not have mentioned at the time because it was too embarrassing then. But my kids started bringing lice home from school repeatedly over a period of about three months, and I nearly lost my mind. We had never had lice before in our family, and the kids had been to several schools. At the time we had our first case, they'd been going to this school for about a year-and-a-half.* 

Annie and Joey reuniting when she got home from camp

Want to know what was the worst thing about it? I felt like I was the only one raising the alarm. I called the school nurse, and she told me that the protocol is not to alert all the parents at the school; just use the shampoo, comb out the nits, and send your kid back the next day. No note? That didn't sit well with me, so I texted the parents of the girls' friends. The first time wasn't so hard, but then it happened again. And again. I was never once on the receiving end of a text that said, "Check your girls' hair. I found lice.😭😭😭" I was always the sender. Everyone probably thought WE were the problem, and my mortification was profound. But my conscience wouldn't let me keep it to myself. And my need to find a solution would not let me keep it to myself, so you know I was asking my Marine wife network on Facebook. The Nix that you get over the counter, that the Naval Health Clinic kept giving us, was not helping. I had tried every remedy, had the girls wear their hair in braids, all the things.

In February, the 5th graders got their chance to go to a little camp for about two or three nights, as was customary. I did not want my daughter to go, but I let her anyway because it was a big deal for her and her little friends. It turned out later to be one of the last normal things she'd get to do with her school friends for awhile. I checked her hair when she got back, and yet again, I found nits.

The consensus on Facebook seemed to be that the only medication that works when nothing else doesn't, is Sklice. Sklice is ivermectin as it so happens. I knew nothing about ivermectin, still don't. All I knew was that, according to my Facebook people, Sklice was highly effective--lice gone, nits gone, instantly. They had all tried the Nix first, but the issue is that the lice these days are becoming resistant to it. Now I knew what I needed to beat this thing once and for all. There was just one problem: our kids' pediatrician refused to prescribe it. After much back and forth, and me tearing my hair out (pardon the pun), Tim decided to go over to the Naval Health Clinic and pay him a visit.

He wasn't going there to intimidate him or anything crazy like that. He just wanted to have a conversation man-to-man. It started with something like this: "Are you married? You have a wife at home?" He then went on to seek the man's compassion and understanding, because surely he must know that when Mama is repeatedly washing and combing kids' hair, turning the house inside out, vacuuming everything, washing every piece of bedding, quarantining the stuffed animals, and repeating this process every few weeks, she is NOT happy. When Mama's not happy, nobody's happy. He did not like having to come home to this every day, and for that matter, he probably started to feel concern that one day he'd get home and see the place burned down. He explained that I had done my research, and the word is that this Sklice stuff is what will actually take care of the problem after everything else has failed, and would he please prescribe it for us?

The doctor heard him out and sympathized, but wouldn't budge. He explained to Tim that he thought the medication was very strong, it would do more harm than good, and that we really didn't want that. Tim told me that he was very sincere, and we both had to respect that he stuck to his guns. With a sigh I thanked him for making the effort. Then realizing that I might have lice myself, or could likely have it very soon, I reached out to my own doctor at the Naval Clinic, and he prescribed me enough to share. Correction: he prescribed enough for me to use more than once.

I was sporting braids too.

With that prescription in hand, I thought my problems would soon be over. The Naval Clinic pharmacy had no Sklice in stock, so I'd have to get it from a civilian pharmacy. But not one had it. I expanded my radius, and I called pharmacies in and out of network with Tricare. No luck. Then out of curiosity more than anything, I started calling pharmacies all over the state, even out of state. No Sklice anywhere. (Interestingly enough, I just looked it up and I see it is currently available without a prescription. Not only that I can get generic ivermectin curbside at Walmart in two hours. I wonder what our old pediatrician would say to that?)

So much for the Sklice. It was the old Nix/combing/washing/vacuuming/bagging up the stuffed animals and extra pillows/rinse, repeat as many times as it takes once again. Then came spring of 2020. Finally, with school shut down, a break from the stupid lice. Wherever it kept coming from (apparently not us!) is where it stayed. I always tell Tim the silver lining for us with the Covid lockdowns, was that they stopped the spread of lice for dang sure. Nothing less would have done it.

I wasn't as vigilant with the boys' hair at first. I remember the first time I went to check Timmy's hair, I didn't even have to comb through it. I could see the lice crawling around as he sat there. It was like being in a horror movie.

That's my blog these days, folks. There's isn't life great, aren't the seasons beautiful, aren't the kids cute? And then by the way, let me tell you about the time we got lice over and over. Haha. At least I spared you some gross pictures. But if your school does give you the courtesy of a heads-up (sorry again) about lice, and you want to know what it is you're looking for, I can help.😊

*Little side rant here: this school had the reputation of being the nicest public school in the area. When Tim and I were house-hunting later that year, we happened to chat with someone in one of the neighborhoods we were driving around, who had worked as school nurse for the entire county. She claimed that the other schools always had lice going around and this one didn't. She didn't know that we had kids going there already, and that I was now the proud owner of a deluxe lice comb with stainless steel teeth, not the standard issue plastic one that comes in the box of Nix. But yes, it was a very nice school. Good teachers, good families, everything updated, shiny and clean. Lice wasn't supposed to happen in a place like this (that's of course a myth--lice do not recognize school districts). And I get it, it's embarrassing; nobody gets it more than me. But the approach of "we're not going to talk about this" was just not doing anyone any favors. That place should have been closed for a good cleaning long before the pandemic, and at the very least, notes should have been sent.