My Mission Statement

I write to serve, to unite, to educate. I write to share literature and flesh out ideas that may be of interest to others. I write to document an emotion, experience, or a blip in time. My mission is to write in such a way that the reader is reminded that we can find humor in all situations. It's one of the great blessings of life.


Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Just When You Think You've Considered Every Career Option...there's the Lice Whisperers

BEWARE: The following post may make you itch.

In our small town, lice usually runs through the school every couple of years or so. If you're lucky, your child will only have it once in his or her school career, but I think it's safe to say that EVERY child gets it at least once. I don't care who you think you are or how untouchably perfect your child is, no one is immune from lice. However true this is, lice still carries a stigma. It's ridiculous, really, like being embarrassed if your kid gets the chicken pox or strep throat, I mean, what's the difference, really? Okay, except it involves small animals LIVING ON YOUR CHILD"S HEAD! I get all itchy just thinking about it. Really. I just had to stop typing to give my head a good scratch. Lice treatment has come a long way, though. When I first began teaching, I had a nice head of long hair and got a nice head full of lice from my kindergartners. In those days, you had to wash your hair with this dry shampoo--anyone remember that? You couldn't WET your hair, you had to get a lather going with this maple syrup-like substance, which was impossible, of course. Then you had to let this stuff set on your head for hours it seemed (maybe 15 minutes?), THEN you had to comb all the nits out with those horrible little combs.

Many years later, my girls got lice in the church nursery. They were very small with relatively little hair, thank goodness, AND the new shampoo allowed WATER! Woo hoo! So their treatment was short and simple, comparatively. However, the new lice treatments are apparently not simple enough for the mothers of the Los Angeles because Amy Goldreyer, the 'lice whisperer', has a hot following.

Taken from the article in Sunday's New York Times, a mother said the nanny discovered live bugs in their daughter's hair. The mom said, get this, "I certainly wasn't going to pick them out myself." Hmmmm....You weren't, eh? YOu wouldn't help your OWN CHILD wash her hair with special shampoo? Was it too icky for you? I mean, COME ON! COME ON! (deep breaths, deep cleansing breaths) What is the matter with these people? It's your stinking kid. And apparently it was also too much for the NANNY! So these two caregivers are too grossed out or too good to help this poor child with a regular old case of lice, so who do they call??

THE LICE-WHISPERER! (okay, the Hair Whisperer) Starting at about $300, SHE will use organic lice shampoo and pick out the nits with a tiny comb. (Okay, ORGANIC shampoo? I'm sorry but if there's ever a time for shampoo with chemicals and additives and other dangerous things, isn't it when you're killing bugs in your hair? Forget the organic here, people) Anyway, she ALSO brings a LOUSEBUSTER (this is true) to your hair which looks like a canister vaccuum cleaner. It uses heat to kill the lice on a child's head.

So picture this, while some of us sneak out to get the shampoo and ring it up when no one is watching because lice still seems kind of freaky. These people have a huge LICE WHISPERER van parked in their driveway. As neighbors peer out the window, a woman with her head fully wrapped carries in large equipment to de-louse your kid. Some clients send for her by private jet. Sounds a little traumatic to me.

Kid comes home. "Nurse at school sent a note to you."
Nanny says, "EWWWW!" Mom says, "EWWW!"
And a total stranger 'deals with it.' The bill can run up to $1000.
Isn't that the same price as a goat for some 20 villages of starving people? Go figure.



I don't even know what to say anymore. If you don't believe me, go to www.hairwhisperer.com

2 comments:

Liz said...

O.M.G. Now I have heard it all.

alison said...

I've tried to imagine what would happen when Walton gets lice in his thick curls. I'm sure that will be the day he gets his head shaved! We had our fair share of it growing up. I even remember lice checks in elem. school. yuk!


Isabel by Donna Jones Koppelman

Isabel by Donna Jones Koppelman

Major Bear at the Grove Park Inn by Donna Jones Koppelman

Major Bear at the Grove Park Inn by Donna Jones Koppelman