LICE, SPIDERS AND BUGS OH MY!!

OK so this week will go down in history at the Brimhall household.

For the first time in my life, I had the misfortune of dealing with LICE. Poor Maya kept on telling me that her head was really itchy---but because itchy scalps are sort of commonplace in our house i didn't think anything of it accept to say to her---guess you got psoriasis too.

Then (and here is where i win the mother of the year award) she tells me that a little grey bug fell out of her hair when she brushed it. I told her that it was just dead skin from her psoriasis head---not to worry about it, looked at her head and sent her off to school.

That night her head was all pussy (that's pronounced with a short u sound!) which again, is not abnormal as far as scalps go in our house---psoriasis is a disgusting skin disease and doesn't go away with any amount of medical shampoos----so i proceeded to wash Maya's hair with head-and-shoulders thinking this might help with the itching. After she brushed her hair, she showed me the brush and said "SEE MOM they are bugs!" Well, me still in my denial, said "No its not! it is just dead skin!!" then one of them MOVED!!! I was still determined to believe that these were some kind of other bug---it can't be LICE! Fleas, flies, whatever--- it can't be LICE.

So I take her to the doctor the next day and guess what---LICE!!! let the FREAKING OUT begin!!! Now as a mom i can handle many things--puke, poop, boogers, pneumonia--but bugs in my daughters beautiful hair, can't even cope!!

This began a laborious weekend of scouring, washing, combing and killing LICE. (mind you we have to repeat the whole process this weekend---just what i wanted to do!) Of course the little creatures had to attack the THICKEST and longest head of hair in the house! So I had to cut about 6 inches of her locks just so i could get through it with a NIT- comb (special tool for removing the eggs that stick to the hair) as it was, it took a good 6 hours to get through her mane. Not to mention the emotional trauma of having to give up all her stuffed animals---supposedly you can bake the little suckers outside, but this mom is not taking any chances! So i had to promise new animals as soon as humanly possible.


So we had to check every ones head to make sure the gross little things didn't take up residence on anyone else's head---so far we're good---but every time i have an itch on my head in the back of my mind i am quietly freaking out, thinking that dandruff has got to be more than dandruff!! SOOO GROSS!

Anyway, as if this entire scenario isn't bad enough---i woke up this morning to a huge brown hairy ugly creepy SPIDER on my ceiling!!!! What is UP??? So i go in search of Raid and i can't find anything that was made to kill bugs, the only thing i can find is Lysol. So I spray the heck out of the little bastard (yes this is how i feel about them--there is no better word, well, that i can write) and he starts to move and i am scared to death that he is going to jump on me---and all those disgusting images of Brown Recluse bites go flashing through my head---so i get the vacuum and try to suck it up. Finally, the vacuum won the war!! Except now i am pretty sure i have a disinfected (Lysol) spider that is still alive in my vacuum!!

Seriously---any thing but bugs---bring it on, i can take it---but one little spider and i'm toast.