Head lice. Two words right there that are enough to scare the living daylight out of any parent. We all fear a head lice infestation in our home, and it will most probably happen at some point. Kids can easily get lice during their time at school, and then it’s just a matter of time before it spreads to other family members – including you! Here are four ways to prevent head lice spreading in your family.
4 Ways to Prevent Head Lice
The good news is, you can get rid of head lice quite easily. Having said that, the better news is that it’s easy to prevent head lice from spreading in your family. Prevention is always better than finding a cure for things, so here are a few ways in which you can stop an infestation in your home:
Keep Hair Tools Separate
Sharing is caring, right? So, we should all share hairbrushes, and other tools used to style and look after our hair, right? Well, no. There are many times in life where it’s good to encourage sharing in your household. However, this is not one of them. If everyone uses the same brush, then you’re pretty much begging head lice to spread. If someone has lice, and they use a brush, then someone else uses the same brush, then the lice will obviously spread. Unfortunately, this happens a lot – particularly if you have toddlers that pick anything up! So, you should get everyone their own hairbrush/hair tools that only they should use. This can help contain an outbreak, and prevent lice from spreading around everyone.
Use A Clarifying Shampoo With Tea Tree Oil
You and your kids are more likely to get head lice if you don’t wash your hair properly. You need to wash it regularly and make sure you use the right shampoo to do so as well. Generally speaking, a clarifying shampoo is well worth getting your hands on. This type of shampoo is designed to give you a proper deep clean that removes all the dirt and gunk in your hair and on your scalp. This could help remove any head lice eggs that may be sitting in your hair ready to hatch. To make things even better, the best clarifying shampoo you can buy is one that also has tea tree oil as one of its ingredients. This is one of the main things that prevent head lice from jumping on your head in the first place. They hate the smell of tea tree oil, so they’ll stay well away. I suggest using this shampoo on your head, but also on your kids heads as well to keep their hair and scalp clean and lice-free.
Check Your Kids Hair Every Day
It may seem tedious, but you need to check your kid’s hair for lice every day. My advice is to do this after they’ve had a bath/shower as it’s just an easy time for you to do it. The benefit of these regular checks is that you’ll catch any lice in their early stages. As a result, it’s a lot easier to stop them from spreading to other people in your home. If you notice one child has lice, then you jump into action and deal with it before anyone else gets affected. The thing with head lice is that your kids don’t show signs of having them until they’ve been in their hair for a good few weeks. The telltale sign is an itchy scalp, but you can spot head lice way before this occurs. With regular checks, you get in there before the first symptoms show, helping you stop the infestation in its tracks.
Wash Pillows And Towels Regularly
One of the easiest ways for lice to spread throughout your family is via pillows or towels. A child with lice will rest their head on your pillow one day, and loads of the little blighters will hop off onto that pillow. Then, you go to sleep at night, and they jump onto your head. The same goes for towels and when your child dries their hair. As a consequence, you need to be very vigilant when it comes to washing pillows/towels. The more often you do it, the better. I think towels are particularly important to wash as they’re more likely to be shared amongst the family. Ideally, everyone should have their own towel, but this doesn’t always happen.
Dealing with a home full of head lice is not ideal at all. Once it starts spreading, it can be very difficult to stop and contain. Hopefully, these simple tips will help you prevent head lice from spreading by dealing with it as early as possible.
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