Nits: a mother’s three failed attempts to root them out, and the head scratching that followed
Lice eradication ointment. Fail. Wine vinegar and olive oil. Another fail, and lots of howls from the children. A blast of conditioner and a comb-out. Also a fail, with more howls. One mother’s battle with some persistent pests
The Hong Kong Science Museum got into a spot of bother this summer after parents took to social media to rant about children becoming infested with head lice after donning helmets while playing with one of the interactive engineering exhibits. The poor museum staff scrambled to refute the allegations. And I sympathised.
Hong Kong Science Museum steps up cleaning after claims of head lice from exhibition helmets
Hats are to nits what Uber is to late night revellers: they get them from A to B quickly. And nits are to mothers what broomsticks were to suspected witches in the 1600s: they herald instant elimination from contact lists and banishment to social Siberia.
I know. I’ve been there. To Social Siberia. It is a cold, lonely place where nobody asks you for coffee, or invites your children to birthday parties.
At first it was funny. It began with an innocuous scratch of the head. One which I ignored. (Well, you do. Don’t you?)
But – inevitably – one itchy head turned into two and before I knew it my three children were among the 42 at school that were tarred and feathered in public and sent home with notes prescribing various toxic treatments that should be used immediately or the child was at risk of temporary expulsion.
The notes actually carried a much weightier message: you are an unfit mother and social pariah. Since I was responsible for 14 per cent of the untouchables, I was more unfit than most.
Nits are extremely easy to acquire (they say of adults, put two heads together and you come up with a good idea; put two children’s heads together and you come up with nits), but they’re not easy to deal with. They are persistent little blighters who don oxygen masks the moment they hear you pop open the lid on the first bottle in your arsenal of lice eradication ointment.