Prevent Head Lice Returning
I have just had a very good comment from Andrea who used the olive oil treatment for treating head lice. I have given several methods for getting rid of head lice in the posts entitled ‘How to Get Rid of Head Lice’ and ‘Does the Olive Oil Treatment Work For Head Lice?’
Andrea has found the olive oil treatment to be successful in getting rid of the head lice which her children had brought home from school. But now she wants to know whether she should stop sending her children to school, as they will get reinfected.
Well, the straight answer is ‘NO, you don’t stop sending your children to school’. Send your children to school just as usual.
The idea is to use natural remedies on the hair at home, once you have gotten rid of the lice, so that the lice do not come back. I will go over some of the things you can do which help to deter lice.
The thing is, that you can catch lice in many places about town: riding on the bus, sitting in the movie theater, rubbing shoulders with people in crowds, or playing with children at school. You can also reinfect the family at home, because lice and their nits will still be about the house somewhere, mainly on the sheets and pillow cases. So you see, it is best not to worry about where or when you might catch lice and in how you can avoid them, but to work on prevention methods instead.
What To Do To Prevent Head Lice Coming Back
- First of all, try to wash all the clothes in hot water if you can.
- Next, make sure that you iron all your family’s sheets and pillowcases and bed clothes. You can use a steam iron to iron those woolen blankets. Also make sure to iron all shirts and singlets.
- Cotton and wool products are the best things to use, as these withstand heat, whereas synthetic fibres such as polyester duvee fillings do not take the heat, which makes those fibres great homes for tiny things such as lice, nits and dust mites. Also, I have found that that theses creatures prefer the magnetic-electrical field which synthetic fibres create . Synthetic fibres are bad for us because they interfere with our own body’s energies, as well as attracting lice and dust mites.
- After every wash of the hair, you should apply real apple cider vinegar to the scalp. Just a quarter of a cup or so will do. Apple cider vinegar makes the scalp acidic, and the potassium and minerals in the apple cider vinegar are very good for the hair. When you wash your hair with soap or shampoo, it makes the hair alkaline, and lice just love alkaline scalps. So by putting on the vinegar, you deter those lice, because they can’t stand the acid nature of the apple cider vinegar.. They really don’t like it. It will help to kill any remaining nits as well, if you use it regularly.
- Then, no more than twice a week, put just two or three finger dabs of liquid iodine onto the scalp and massage it in. You don’t need to cover the hair with this. You MUST NOT cover the hair with iodine, as it is absorbed into the pores of the scalp, and you might get toxic effects if you do this. Iodine is necessary for good health, but we only need just a tad now and then. A little of the iodine will be transferred over the head with brushing, and this is enough to have an effect on any head lice. Just two dabs of IODINE on the scalp twice a week will help prevent catching head lice from other people, or off the couch, or something. NOTE – DO NOT PUT IODINE ONTO THE SCALP STRAIGHT AFTER YOU PUT ON CIDER VINEGAR. YOU MUST WAIT AT LEAST EIGHT HOURS BEFORE PUTTING ON ANY IODINE. It is not dangerous to use them together, but they just do not mix together very well. They work best when they are used separately, at different times.
- Use the olive oil treatment once a week, whether you can see any lice or not. This will take care of any stray lice which are about, and prevent them from laying eggs in the hair. Olive oil is very good for the hair and nourishing to the scalp. You can tell the children to regard it as a conditioner rather than a regular lice treatment.
- Other things which work as preventatives, or prophylactics, are the essential oils lavender, rosemary, tea tree, pine oil, eucalyptus oils. But you only need a drop or two once or twice a week. I find that these were not popular with my children, as they have a strong smell which caused them to be teased at school. Iodine worked better for us as a preventative, as it does not smell at all, and you need so little of it for it to work in preventing head lice.
- Extra Vitamin B is helpful in dettering head lice. Use the dose for children as stated on the bottle. Keeping the diet rich in alkaline foods such as carrots, apples, broccoli, bean sprouts, lettuce, cabbage etc goes a long way to helping prevent head lice. Try to reduce the amount of wheat and bread and pastries in the diet, and encourage the children to eat carrots, celery and apples for snacks instead of sweets or bread. A good balanced meal once or twice a day, with protein, plenty of greens and rice or potatoes is a good standard, of course.
- Finally, BRUSHING the hair is so important. This energises the scalp, the nerves, and encourages hair growth. Brushing helps your scalp to stay healthy, and a healthy scalp helps to deter head lice.