Willa turns 7, gets head lice

 Willa turned seven in October, I can hardly believe it! I feel like every time I look at her she seems older and older. She had a fun day at school. I wasn't able to be there, I can't remember why - but I think mainly because I couldn't bring in June and Lars. But her teacher took some pictures and sent them to me. This fun school day was on Friday.

Her birthday fell on Saturday and she was so excited to do the party on the actual day. The new My Little Pony movie had just come out, so we decided to invite some friends to go see the movie with us. I was going to write that it was a "My Little Pony" party, but Willa was adamant that she wanted a Mermaid or Lego party, but since we were going to a Ponies movie, that fact kind of got missed.

I thought it would be a super fun treat to take her to get a beautiful blowout at the salon the morning of her birthday. That way her hair would be glossy and wavy for the party and everything would just be perfect. She was super excited started out! They washed her and got her all set.

 So fun and cute!!!

It was such a great idea until the worker left for a moment and came back with her supervisor. The supervisor started looking through Willa's hair and suddenly it dawned on me. I was like, "Does she have LICE?!!!" And sure enough, nits, nits everywhere. I'm sorry if anyone is grossed out by this. I was and am still super grossed out!! But I also want to be real about our life. So of course they couldn't finish the blowout, I had them check June's and my hair. June was clean but they said there was a few nits on my head!!! Barf, barf, double barf!!!

We drove straight to CVS and bought the stuff they recommended and then headed home to treat our hair. We actually treated everyone's hair except for Lars. The salon said once we did the shampoo and combed, then we could still hold her birthday and she wouldn't be contagious. I thought long and hard about what to do. It was heartbreaking having to make her leave the salon and not knowing whether she could still have her party. In the end, I texted all the parents and told them what had happened. Everyone was super nice and about half the kids still came (3 out of 6).

The party was much more low-key than we had been planning but I was just so exhausted and on edge. Luckily, the salon was like at 8 or 9 a.m. and the party wasn't until the afternoon, so we had time to comb out the hair and clean the house, but just barely. I felt so overwhelmed and helpless thinking about bagging up all the pillows and stuffed animals, washing all the linens, steaming the couches! Ryan helped but I should also mention that our car desperately needed new brakes and he had all the stuff to change those out that day too. In fact, he attempted a more tricky repair that was pretty difficult, so we were stressed and busy the whole day.

We decorated a little the night before - (pre-lice)

 Ryan made this cute Rarity for "Pin the tail on the pony"

 Willa got a candle in her waffles.

 Our party crew. Robin, Bridgett, and Alisse - a friend from school.

 My neighbor Christine made this really cute Rarity pony cake!

 At the movie theater, not a great photo but it's documented.

Finally, that night after the girls were in bed and everything was cleaned out, I finally had time for Ryan to comb out my hair. My hair wasn't too bad, but mentally it was horrible not knowing and freaking out. So disgusting.

I kept thinking about a recent conference talk that was about social media and only showing the positive parts of our life. I considered posting a picture of Willa's birthday cake with the lice comb next to it and saying "Happy Birthday Willa!" on Instagram or Facebook. I thought better of it, however, and just decided to keep this embarrassing, disgusting, horrifying, grotesque incident all to ourselves (and this blog). I know lice isn't supposed to be a big deal, but I just felt so out of control. How had I not noticed this before? How could you not noticed bugs in your hair? I felt powerless to really know if we beat it. I combed out the girls' and my hair frequently over the next few weeks. About two weeks after I found a few new eggs in Willa's hair. So I must have missed one egg in the original treatment, it takes about a week to hatch, then another week before it can lay more eggs.... I retreated her and kept combing. Finally, we were rid of it.

My neighbor admitted that her daughter had lice about a month before Willa, but she hadn't told us about it at the time. The girls play together a lot and I'm fairly certain this is where Willa got it from. Though... I suppose Willa could have given it to the girl too. The gross thing is that the nits had grown out an inch or so in Willa's hair so you know that she had had it for a while. The other thing I realized is that lice is not so super contagious in Las Vegas. I think because of the hot and dry climate. It seemed very contagious in Houston, because it was so humid. But Willa and June had been sharing towels, combs, brushes, headbands, you name it - and June didn't have any. So I don't think it spreads very well here, but you just have to be careful to get every single tiny last egg when you are going through the hair. Still, I think you should be responsible and 'fess up to other parents if your child gets it. I contacted Willa's teacher at school and her class had to do a lice check and had a letter sent home. I was also really careful to clean all her jackets, her backpack, and the carseats in the car. The lice will only be on the head, but anywhere that a loose hair with a nit attached is fair game. But again, that brings me to why I don't think it really spreads that well in Vegas - because once the hair is unattached from the head, the climate just isn't right and the eggs probably don't hatch.

It ended up not being the greatest birthday in the entire world, but it is certainly one we will remember. And just typing this makes me want to go comb through my hair with a nit comb again!