The Drama of the Day for yesterday occurred when my babysitter brought the Peanut over to me and said, "Look at this. I think these are lice eggs in her hair."
Needless to say, this was far from welcome news. I have no idea what lice eggs look like, so to me it just looked like lint. But I thought, well, maybe she picked something up at the day care center, so I called them to ask about it. This set off a panic: "We haven't seen that in 10 years! You have to bring her to the doctor! Don't bring her back in until you confirm she doesn't have it!"
So that was the end of my normally peaceful work-at-home day. I started stripping off bedding, vacuuming, and preparing to sterilize the teddy bears by running them through the dryer. But luckily, the pediatrician confirmed it was a false alarm -- just some kind of food particles in the Peanut's hair.
As much of a pain as this was, we learned what to look for. If you see tiny white particles in the hair near the back of the neck and behind the ears, and they don't come off when you try to comb them out, that's probably lice.
We're thankful that the worst thing to emerge from this episode is that now the Peanut has learned the word "lice," and is running around yelling it at the top of her lungs. ("LICE! LICE! LICE!") Annoying, but not as annoying as having to disinfect the entire house.
2 comments:
Apparently, lice is quite common now. My pre-school has never had it, but several of my friends have had it at their schools, and they've gone through the whole washing, disinfecting rigamarole.
Still, eek. Glad she's lice-free :-)
You would THINK! that in this day and age of modern medicine that we could eradicate lice. I hear every kid usually gets it sooner or later. Something to look forward to!
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