The Realm of the Evil Hair Fairies...

Merry Meet and Welcome Friends and Lurkers!

Warning! If you suffer from entomophobia (an irrational fear of insects) this may freak you out considerably! Personally, I don't have an irrational fear of insects, I just intensely dislike some of them more than words can describe!

Still reading? You were warned!

Despite having been preoccupied with Samhain/Halloween celebrations, The Witch's Ball and other important life altering events, things have been humming along fine..just fine. Little did I know that my happy existence was going to turn into....

:::insert my impression of Marisa Tomei as Mona Lisa Vito in "My Cousin Vinny"::::

"Oh My God! What a fucking Nightmare!"

After the Halloween/Samhain weekend, my daughter began complaining of an itchy rash on her neck. Upon examination, I saw some redness where she'd been scratching, but no real sign of a rash. I thought that perhaps I had used some new laundry detergent or shampoo and that it had irritated her sensitive skin. Kyla tends to be a raging hypochondriac, which I must confess she inherited from me, so it really isn't unusual for her to turn some minor discomfort into a crisis. Still, she seemed to be truly uncomfortable so I offered her some Benadryl. The next day, she proclaimed that she was "fine".

A day or two later however, she was itching so badly she was in tears and had scratched so hard she was bleeding. Now, I'm legally blind without my contacts. I can see only a tad better if I take them out or with my glasses off, and only if I look at something really, really closely. I decided to re-examine her neck sans the lenses and indeed there was a fine red rash on her neck that seemed to travel into her hairline. I still suspected an allergic reaction, so I gave her another dose of Benadryl and decided that if she was still miserable, I would take her to the pediatrician.

The next morning, as I was blissfully sipping my morning coffee, Kyla came down for breakfast and I noticed her scratching. I asked her to come over so that I could take a look at her. As I examined her neck, I began scolding her for not brushing her hair well enough. As I used my fingers to untangle her hair, what I saw made me recoil in horror!!!! I recognized all too well what was making her miserable, because it was the very thing that I've dreaded most since the moment she entered Kindergarten! My deepest, darkest, most dreaded fear! Head fucking lice!!!! I began to hyperventilate. I felt faint!!!! I felt nauseous!!! I screamed, "Raaaaaaaaaaaaay!!!!!!"

This was not happening! Oh, but it was! Head Lice! Head Lice? When? Where? How? Kyla had three, count em', three sleep-overs in the days following Samhain. Now not only was I horrified, but I was friggin' mortified as well!!! I realized that I had to call each of the parents of these children and be the bearer of the news that my child may have inflicted this dreaded plague on their family! But wait, where did Kyla get them? And why hadn't any of these responsible parents picked up the phone to give me a head's up (no pun intended)and warn me that my life was about to turn into something akin to the Hindenburg Disaster? Interestingly enough, when I began making these phone calls, instead of being confronted by angry, defensive parents, what I encountered was a nonchalant "been there, done that" attitude, that for me, seemed completely surreal! Did they not hear what I was saying??? I'm talking head lice, dammit!!!! Head fucking lice!!! They may have had an air of nonchalance, but I was completely buggin'!!! Literally!

Ok, I know. You're probably thinking "Oh, Tracy, the DRAMA!!!" And I agree, I sound like a raving lunatic, don't I? Ghosts? Vampires? Witches? Nah, that describes some of my closest friends! This, for me, is the stuff of true horror stories! I must confess, I have harbored a morbid fear of lice since childhood when two of my best friends were diagnosed with them. While I wouldn't abandon my friends in their time of need, I was friggin' terrified that I would get them! After we would play together, I would come home and obsessively brush out my waist length hair until my scalp was sore!!! And, somehow by the grace of the Gods, I managed to (knock wood, tossing salt over my left shoulder, rubbing a lucky rabbit's foot on my ass) avoid getting them. That said, I was totally unprepared to deal with them now...forty years later!

Still, I needed to consolidate my feces and form a plan of action! I called the pediatrican, who made little effort to alay my fears! Their advice, don't send her to school, go to the pharmacy and buy some anti-lice treatment and start nitpicking? What?! Oh yes, the shampoo does not remove the hellacious microscopic eggs that the little lice ass bastards leave behind. They need to be removed, by hand, one by one!! Now keep in mind, each louse can lay up to 100 eggs. OH.MY.GOD!!!! Doctor ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!!!!!!!

And so it began. For those of you who know me, you already know how compulsive I am about cleaning. With the menagerie I have, I need to be. Now imagine me on crack and you'll have some idea of the approach I've taken to de-bugging my existence. Every person in my house has been throughly examined and treated, whether they had them or not. Even after being examined and deemed, "bug free", I pleaded with Ray every couple of hours to recheck me. He had just about enough of my neuroses. He actually had the nerve to go to bed, leaving me alone...with THEM! He was awakened at Midnight however, to sound of the shower running as I treated myself for imaginary lice. So far, Ray and I have managed to escape them (knocking wood, tossing salt, rubbing lucky rabbit's foot on my ass!) Justin, unfortunately, wasn't quite as lucky.

I will dispense with the nitpicking, but let it suffice to say that I have never vacuumed, done as much laundry or used as much Clorox in my entire life!!! And just to give you a better idea of kind of madness I have resorted to in order to eradicate these "ento mo fo's", and yes, that is the slang term for insect mother fuuu...never mind, you know what I mean, the entire family is required to wear surgical caps, at all times!

In "googling" the websites for information regarding this problem, I found the best quote by a sympathetic parent.

"Do you have any wine? All of this would go a lot smoother in an altered state of reality."

In darkness, light!


Tracy