So, this is not the best topic to be discussing but im sure it has happened to some dreadies out there. So my head has been really itchy lately. I thought it was the dry weather here paired with the fact that I ran out of rosemary oil and just thought my head was dry. My dreads are only 5 months old. some in the front are twist and rip made but the back has been free to dread. they are looking awesome if I may add. so anyway, i didn't really think much of it until my head started itching sooo bad i just knew it had to be something living on my head. I thought lice, but my husband couldn't see anything!! well when my daughter (6yrs) started itching her head more than normal I knew something was up. I looked through her head and couldn't believe it!! Lice!! We homeschool but she still goes to a charter school 1 day a week so im thinking that's where they came from??!! I don't know, but I remember having them as a kid. It's hard having lice, but having lice with DREADS!! We are already stereotyped, even my own mother who is pretty open minded about a lot of things said she always thought dreads looked kinda "dirty" and I should just comb them out. I am not one to care much about what others think but i just have some reservation about her school knowing that we have lice and them all thinking it came from us! Know what i mean?! Lice does not like dirty hair and they don't care how much money you have and all that, but i hate when others assume things like that!!
so anyway...I read on here that SE recommended straight alcohol and ACV to kill them. I had been washing with A LOT of TT oil before that and the itch has gotten better but last night I tried the strong concoction and it was horrible! (wrapped my head with plastic wrap and let sit for almost an hour with the alcohol and like 25min with the ACV). let me tell you!! but my head does feel WAY better. I did not want to do such a thing to my daughter so the first night i noticed them on her i washed her hair with BS and TT oil, let it sit, then rice with ACV and TT. oh, and I picked All the live ones out for an hour!! then when she fell asleep, I rubbed coconut oil/olive oil, TT mix on her head then wrapped her head in plastic wrap and a towel around that to protect the pillow, then put a head band around it to hold in place. the next morning i could see dead lice on her towel! then i washed her head again with shampoo and TT, ACV/TT rinse. Tonight I did the shampoo/TT let sit for like 30min, then ACV rinse, let sit for 10min. then wash and condition with TT added. her head looks pretty clean, just see the nits(eggs) which im hoping will die! So my questions and concerns are as follows, (sorry for the long post!)
1. is the alcohol going to damage my dreads?
2.the acv makes my 5 month old dreads very soft, are they going to start coming out?
3. should I just cut my hair or will this work?
4. how long and how will I know they are all gone?
5. has anyone else gone through this?
I REALLY want to keep my babies!! They were looking so awesome and now this happened. I am sooo sad, I hope I and they will recover!! Thanks for reading and helping;)
Peace and hippiness
updated by @blueberrymomma: 01/13/15 09:40:26PM