Sometimes the Worst Gifts come in Small Packages

Last Sunday we were sitting in church and Sam quietly laid his head in my lap and told me I could touch his hair. For those of you who know about Sam's sensory issue with his head you will know that this was somewhat of a breakthrough for Sam. So I started to run my fingers through his hair and was telling him how much I liked the blond streaks he had. I looked a little closer and saw something a little odd. I took a closer look and saw strange little dots in his hair. When I tried to get one out I found it was rather sticky. I knew this was not a good thing and although I had never seen lice before, I had a pretty good hunch this was it. I leaned over to Ronny and told him I think Sam has head lice. What I didn't realize at that moment was how much work lay ahead of us.

So for those of you who have not had this little experience in your house, know that it is inevitable, expensive, and very frustrating. Pray you catch it early before it spreads and then pray for strength as it is a long haul! If one person in the family has it everyone gets treated whether you think they have it or not. It turns out Sam and Charley both had it but we caught it before it spread to anyone else.

Ronny was sent to the store to buy the shampoo, gel, and combs. (When it comes to head lice the ox is in the mire on Sunday!) Man I tell you, I plan to take out stock in the RID company because this stuff is pricey. The next several hours of last Sunday was spent washing everyones hair with this insecticide shampoo, combing out everyones hair with the gel and combs, striping every bed of pillow, sheets and blankets, then gathering anything and everything that may have touched someones head in the last couple weeks and boiling them, finding every hat and running them through the dryer, and bagging every stuffed animal in the house. So for 6 people, 1 of which is a young girl with long hair, and 3 other young children you can imagine how much work that was. We finished combing Charley's hair out at midnight that Sunday. Ronny was kind enough to read to us while I combed her hair ( it took a couple hours to get through it). Then Ronny had to comb through my hair which took at least another hour. We managed to crawl into bed about 1:30 a.m. knowing we had a mountain of laundry to tackle the next day. I should have taken a picture of the laundry pile, it was taller than the washing machine!

I called the schools the next day to inform them of the situation and to let them know the kids would not be there. It was then we found out that lice was going around in two of them. Charley's school had 7 kids in her grade alone sent home the previous week with it. What happened to the letter they were supposed to send home? Needless to say I'm a little annoyed with this gift someone blessed us with. I then went through the process of cutting the boys hair. All of Sam's beautiful golden streaks lay gone. If you've read the previous hair cutting stories you will understand why I cried when it was Ben's turn. All his baby hair gone. He looks so much older and nothing like my baby boy.

So we got through this week pretty much in a daze. The instructions on the shampoo say we have to retreat in 7-10 days to kill the bugs that were eggs last week. This morning I went through Charley's hair again (I've done this every day this week) and found 2 more bugs. Grrrrr! Can you guess what we will be doing today?