News From the Parenting Front
And Now…..LICE!
Yes ladies and gents in blogland, today’s big news is that my girls have lice. Ah, the joys of kindergarten. A month ago Eden came home and said, “At circle time Kate said she has to put all her toys in plastic bags for four weeks!” Well, for those of you who aren’t parents this is never good news. That was our first case of lice in Room 203. (This was right before strep throat went around, which Eden also brought home. Just finished the antibiotics for that one.) Two weeks ago Eden told me her best friend Rosie went to get a haircut and the hairdresser told her she had lice. Last week Eden skipped off the bus and said, “Rosie found a comb in her backpack so we played beauty parlor on the bus!”
Great.
So for the past week I’ve been checking Eden, who’s been itchy, but so far no evidence of lice. Yesterday, I re-checked Eden who was scratching her neck and sure ‘nuf — practically microscopic eggs.
So what does that mean? Wash hair, medicate hair, wait 10 minutes, wash hair again, comb hair in 1/2inch segments (this takes 1 ½ hours each), vacuum the house, vacuum the furniture, wash all the bedding, put all the stuffed animals in the dryer on high for 30 minutes (four loads), wash the car seat covers, wash the duvet covers, put all the bedspreads in the dryer for 30 minutes each (3 loads), find all the afghans and wash, feel guilty about possibly bringing it to the preschool classroom and wash all dress up cloths/dolls/etc. etc. etc. Then, to follow up, wash the children’s hair and comb through in 1 inch segments every night for three weeks. (By the way, Paul did the lion’s share of this vacuuming laundry business last night while I nitpicked the girl’s hair. Yeah Paul!)
Why am I telling you this? Because I think it says a lot about what it’s like to be a woman in ministry. I had two hours to work today and it’s gone, evaporated. Bye bye! And also, I think if you’re thinking of having children right now, you should think very very carefully. I mean, my children have definitely made me a better person. But raising kids is truly the hardest thing I’ve ever done, and most of the tasks around childrearing, I don’t really like. The kids, I love. The work, not so much. (Of course, right now they are playing clue and monopoly in my office and Catie is humming under her breath and it’s all very sweet.) Oh, and also, I just feel like complaining, cuz lice look like this and that’s stinky, ya know?
Oops. There’s the buzzer on the dryer. Got to go swap. If Pooh Bear doesn’t get centrifuged before bedtime I’m toast.
Today, when Eden got off the bus, she chirped, “Today Maude told us she had scarlet fever!”
Lovely.
OK… so now maybe I’m not so disappointed I didn’t beat my way through the crowd to chat with you last week.
Keep the faith.
Sorry!!!!! Hope you can kill the buggers off real soon!
I wish I would have registered www.headlice.org back when the ‘net was just getting popular. Imagine what it’d be worth today!!!!
don’t worry - I had scarlet fever two weeks ago - all gone. Or at least thought I had. antibiotics cleared it all up. Turns out that it’s not a deadly disease anymore like it was in the 1800’s. Go figure. I’m sorry about the lice and stuff. I’m glad about your kids. You remind me a lot of my best friend and her three little kids. Her oldest son is almost 7, her youngest is 3. They live in a perpetual state of mess and ministry.
Thanks for sharing your daily stuff with us - belive it or not, it makes for pretty interesting reading - and I hope it somehow takes a load off for you. Vent anytime!
I am laughing so hard right now. You have just shown me grace.
Oh God.
And I thought I was excited about finding the right woman, getting married and having kids. Lice makes me consider monastic life.
Although, it does make for a good blog entry. You know you’re a blog-fool, when you run all the experiences of your life through a blog-filter. “Now, THAT would make a good entry.”
For example, a good friend of mine, Rev Ride (http://revride.blogs.com) ran into a 77 yr old woman yesterday snowboarding and broke her leg. The first thing I said to him was, “Dude, you HAVE to blog about that.”
Sad.
I’m new here - but I saw the “L word” as we refer to it at our house and had to read…… you have my sympathies. We had it at our house (3 out of four of us - i knew my husband wasn’t home enough) and I swear i still have post traumatic stress syndrome. A word from someone who has been there - buy tea tree oil and put some in all of your bottles of shampoo - forever cause you will freak every time someone scratches their head.
Ohh. getting itchy already!
Also been there, done that. My oldest daughter and I both had it. Tea Tree oil is good. Also, the only thing I found effective was olive oil to saturate the hair and a plastic shower cap over that. Suffocates the little buggers. Necessary because some lice are developing a resistance to the lice killing shampoos used to treat the condition.
My prayers are with you.