Submitted by throwRA-licegirl t3_108ywgr in relationship_advice
Hi, throwaway because my girlfriend knows my Reddit.
My (26F) girlfriend (22F) works in childcare. About eight months or so ago, she caught head lice from the children she works with. This is a genuine occupational hazard, and one I'm familiar with from my own childhood and teenage years (I was the one who noticed when she started scratching), so I did my best not to freak out as we got down and dirty with the treatment and combing.
She has very long and thick wavy hair, so this was a real struggle, and for weeks, we just couldn't shift her lice. I thankfully have my hair in a bob, so even though I inevitably caught them too, I was easily sorted, but my girlfriend's lice just kept coming back. Maybe we were missing some eggs in her long hair during the endless combing, or maybe she was getting reinfested at work, but this went on and on, and she got more and more frustrated.
About two months in, she pretty much gave up trying to treat her hair properly. She claimed that it's pointless trying to eradicate her lice problem when she'll just get them again from the kids at work, and now, every time I try to bring this topic up, she tries to shut discussion down, making all sorts of excuses about how lice are just part and parcel of her line of work, and insisting that it's fine because she does the occasional comb-out in the shower to keep the lice under control. Every time I offer to do the combing for her, she says we have to set aside time for it because it takes so long, but when the time comes, so does another excuse for why we can't do it right now.
Six months of going around in circles has worn me down.
This is getting really frustrating because we live together in a one-bedroom flat, and it's a pain in the arse constantly discovering every few weeks that she's passed them to me again. The itching drives me mad, I don't enjoy combing, and it's a total turn-off when she puts her head against mine during sex.
I get that she's insecure about it, because I've lived this experience myself, having constantly had lice as a kid all the way up to secondary school, because my younger half-siblings kept giving them to me. But I also know that, with enough effort, you can get rid of lice, and even do quite a lot to prevent yourself from getting them again. I know they're basically harmless, but they're gross and annoying. It's also super embarrassing when I have them too, especially when I'm at work or out with friends constantly trying not to scratch. Thankfully nobody else knows, but we probably just fly under the radar as immaculately presented femmes.
I love this girl, but I am so sick of her never-ending lice problem. I really want to help her, but how do I crack this? How do I get it into her head that I want this sorted out for her sake?
tl;dr: Girlfriend has had head lice for about eight months, and has given up trying to treat her hair properly. How do I help her?