storbarnsförälder

Poor Linnea is eating biscuits and crying, because I just fine-combed her hair. And the part she doesn't realise is I didn't use the finest comb, so it will be worse next time, when I've found the best fine-comb. She has raw scratched spotty parts behind her ears and at the back of her neck, and lots of brown dirt stuck to her hair - I don't know whether that's louseshit or eggcases, because eggcases always looked white on my dark hair but perhaps they look brown on fair hair.

She's also very very upset that I put the lice down the drain. She wants me to find a kinder way of dealing with them. They might get lost and not be able to find each other again. Their mothers will be upset if they can't find the babies. Stop it!

I only found four adults and lots and lots of juveniles, so it looks like a fairly recent infestation, so it ought to be easy enough to keep on top of. I only had one adult in my own hair.

I have a passionate hatred of lice. Until I was eleven, I sat next to a child who was never treated for headlice, and I got finecombed and covered in foul-smelling insecticide constantly throughout the school term. My hair was unusually fine, and very long, and very very thick (it's much thinner now, though just as fine).

I'm really angry at the lice for what they did to my daughter. Her neck looks sore. She has little spots of blood on her scalp. And they left dirt in her lovely hair.