Lice and Fleas

Well Hello out there its been awhile! Its nice when a client says that they enjoyed my blog1 And it means I should blog more! I really, really, really love my job. I think that lice only like really interesting people. I learn new things every day from the kids and their families.
Today I met a great family who love dogs. Members of their family foster dogs and their obsession is beating fleas! I was very interested because when I went to a male (I'm biased against males - they just don't seem to see lice) pharmacist he said he would look at my hair and said he didn't see anything and thought the problem was fleas. Ugh. Anyway I now realize that the reason that are so worried about nits is because of fleas! Head lice are much more specialized creatures than fleas. Their eggs need to have the right heat and moisture to hatch. Thats why they like laying their eggs behind the ears and nape of the neck. These conditions are so important to them that developed a super glue to keep them there! Once a nit is off the hair it is basically not viable. I have been using the analogy of if you left a chicken egg on your couch it wouldn't hatch! Well fleas have a completely different strategy! They lay their eggs on the animal and they are supposed to fall off and then they can wait til the proper conditions occur and then hatch! So I'm thinking somewhere along the line people got them mixed up? Harvard did a study about bagging things for two weeks and found that nothing hatched. Once a nit is off the head its done. The best part of the visit was when I combed out a louse the Auntie would grab it quick and snap it! Apparently cuz fleas jump you have to snap them in two before they jump away! Thank goodness lice don't jump and only crawl. It was weird seeing someone wanting to touch the louse!
That reminds me if your kid is scratching their head uncontrollably they have LICE! We all make excuses why they are scratching (climate was my excuse) The poor Mom had been driven to distraction by her child's head scratching! She was thinking it was ezcema. Its also amzing the power of the brain. The Mom had said she hadn't last night because of the horrible itching. She had found one bug on her head and it must've been a boy there were no nits or bugs when I got there. She just had empathy itching! Well I'll have to blog again soon - maybe tomorrow cuz just writing this one is reminding me of a few other antedotes.