CRISTINA ROSE 0:04
Hey friends, welcome to this week’s episode of “Not Your Momma’s Podcast” today I’m excited we have our special guest, Eileen Steinberg, also known as the lice queen, as the founder and CEO of the Center for lice control. She’s on a mission to educate the public and eradicate head lice in the US, boasting over 20 years of hands on experience in treating and preventing lice infestations. You know what I’m so excited, we’re talking about this topic, because it’s only a matter of time that our kids or even us as adults are going to experience lice.
EILEEN STEINBERG 0:41
Oh, thank you so much. First of all, Christina, for having me on. I enjoy listening to your podcast. So I’m grateful to be a part of it and help your community answer these questions. And hopefully at the end, we will discover that lice is a compliment. And only the sweetest people get it. And a lot of the hype and misinformation is what worries us. But is not the focus of being productive that getting rid of this or dealing with it. So thank you
CRISTINA ROSE 1:15
No, thank you. So how can parents easily identify and prevent head lice in their children?
EILEEN STEINBERG 1:22
So the objective is to find lice in an early stage. I have coined this phrase in my salon, but I call it pre lice, from exposure to somebody that has an active contagious case. If you do get lice from them, you fall into in the first like two to three weeks, really like 14 to 18-20 days. You have what is the exposure evidence that you have been exposed to lice, but you’re not contagious yet. Okay. So I call that pre lice. You want to find lice in the pre lice stage before a person has enough to share. So recognizing that the lifecycle is seven to 10 days, take seven to 10 days for the nits which are the eggs to hatch and another seven to seven to 10 days for them to mature. So that’s your window you want to find it before. Those first nits hatch and mature. So the bug the adult females what makes a person or an item contagious, okay. And by item, I mean hairbrush. It’s not in your house in order to clean your house. But from exposure, it takes that amount of time for that new host, who is now just left with eggs that are incubating to then hatch and mature once they mature. Now that person is contagious, the longer they’ve had it, the more they’re contagious. So finding lies in the pre life stage is not easy to see with a few nuts. Because it’s you know, if you see one, you got lucky. And if you’re new at this, you’re like, I have no idea what I’m looking at. So the best is what I kind of developed in the salon to teach parents how to check easy is what I call a peace of mind combing had checked, so you need a good nit comb. Okay, really any nit comb has enough to do a head check. But any nit comb except unless it has a yellow handle any nit comb with a blue handle or green handler red hands off, they’re not great. Or hit purple. I think there is the yellow one is but I use a metal handled Netcom which is the net free Terminator COMM And that is good enough to check and treat with. But ultimately, by doing that peace of mind, combing head check and wiping the comb on white paper towel. That’s how you’re going to find lice at an early stage. And like I said, you want to find it in the pre stage time. So that would essentially be doing a combing head check. A peace of mind combing head check twice a month, beginning of the month and the middle of the month recognizing it takes, you know, up to two weeks to be contagious. If you’re doing those two checks a month for preschool, middle elementary school and middle school if you have younger siblings that then high school once a month.
CRISTINA ROSE 4:32
Okay, and you’re just looking for like a little egg that’s attached to you know, the hair follicle is that like kind of what you’re looking for. And I know I remember hearing like if you’ve flake it and it moves it’s probably dandruff but if you’re like flick it with your hand and it doesn’t move and it stays and it’s an egg like a lightsaber knit. What were your what you’re calling it right.
EILEEN STEINBERG 4:57
So that is a knit is the in pretty much the same color as the hair, the only reason why people say that it looks white or cream is because the light hits it, and it’s shiny, so it feels like a knot stuck on the hair shaft. So you physically want to single out that hair that has something on it and run your finger along it. And if you feel that bump, then it’s probably something to be concerned of. If it smashes off its product or dandruff or cradle cap or something.
CRISTINA ROSE 5:31
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EILEEN STEINBERG 6:43
Okay, so real quick, I’m going to rattle off some things. But most importantly, you don’t have to clean your house because head lice is not fleas or bedbugs. So you’re not cleaning your house for knits or eggs that are laid in your house. It’s only for that adult female. Because she’s the contagious one. She’s not leaving her human host for an inanimate object, like the bed, or a stuffed animal or anything like that, or the carpet or the sofa. So it’s what happens on the carpet or the sofa. When heads are together. That’s its head that contact. Not everybody is itchy from having head lice, you don’t feel lovebugs actually crawling, you feel an allergic reaction to the bug bite. So if a person is having an allergic reaction, only then are they itchy. And that can take up to six to eight weeks from exposure. And that person has been now contagious for a while. In addition to that, if you take allergy medication, which we’re getting into that season, you may never be itchy because it’s an allergic reaction that you won’t feel lice, like hair doesn’t matter if it’s clean or dirty. And it doesn’t matter what ethnicity you are. If you have hair on your head and you’re a sweet person, you can get lice deterrent products. I wish I could say that they worked and I would invest in them and sell them but people try and put you know, the shampoos and sprays and gel or hairspray. None of it. We treat people that use that stuff. Yeah. So none of that works. And then we’ll get into this in another question I imagine but the over the counter products that have permethrin in them no longer are effective. And so it’s very hard to get rid of lice if you have had it a while. Yeah, with the over the counter products. So I say that people that come in to me now that have lice. They probably got it from somebody that’s trying to get rid of it because nobody wants this.
CRISTINA ROSE 8:51
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EILEEN STEINBERG 10:12
I love this question. Because we’re so quick to rely on the school nurse or your daycare administration to like control the outbreak and communicate to people on tell you what to do. The reality is that let’s go to the elementary school setting where most of this comes from. You have your school nurse that’s managing your kids classroom. But it’s not your classroom. And it’s not your first grade or your third or fifth grade. It’s the entire school that that one person has now been put in control of an entire schools outbreak. Head lice control needs to be at home, when you’re relying on other people to communicate that they’ve had it. They it’s not, that’s not a great model, because people are not going to communicate. And if they do, schools are communicating less and less because lice is not a medical issue. It’s a socially unacceptable thing to have. Yeah, makes which is wrong, which is wrong, because you get it for all the right reasons, because you get it from having head to head contact. So when families come in, I say When have you snuggled when you hug each other, when have you worked closely together where your heads are touching. And parents just watch your kids playing on the playground or with their siblings or in a classroom setting or play date. Their heads are touching all the time. They’re Space Invaders, it’s how they learn to be connected. And, and trust people and be safe. And then the huggers, that love to hug that’s the sweet person that grows up to be that person that you want to be around by telling them not to do these behaviors is just sad, right like that. You’re not letting them be who they are. But if you go back to that combing, head check, if you did that combing, head check, wipe your comb on a white paper towel, you’re gonna find the brown nits and lice on the white paper towel, but the white dandruff will disappear. So that will tell you if you have it or not, don’t rely on school, and the school nurse is going to do a visual check. Yeah, and that’s hard to find. That’s, that’s hard to find in the pre life stage, you’re only going to find an egregious case. But when it comes to the teams and school, if you have it, get over yourself, tell people
CRISTINA ROSE 12:44
I remember like, you’d get it from being in the sandbox, you know, if you were a kid and stuff. And so kind of going back to what we were talking about earlier, like what is the most effective and safe treatment, you know, for lice, you know, products that parents can use at home, you know, without, you know, resorting to like pesticides or harsh chemicals and things like that.
EILEEN STEINBERG 13:09
So, if it smells bad, it doesn’t mean that it works better. And people do truly believe and so permethrin, which is a main ingredient in most of the over the counter products, whether they’re a brand name or a store brand. If it says permethrin the only time you’re going to have a six level of success by just following the instructions would be at that pre lice stage. Beyond that, it’s really hard to get rid of because the combs aren’t tight enough because they have a plastic handle. So you can find lice with it very hard to be successful removing the knits permethrin because I’m pretty sure it has a lot to do with the pandemic. It was already growing resistant, but the people that had lice going into lockdown kept treating it with permethrin and that’s what makes it less effective. So then they the people that didn’t get rid of it came out of the pandemic, and were with people and since they didn’t get rid of it, they shared it, but they now shared a way more resistant strain of lice. So what I and I have affiliate services that I’ve trained and also use my products. They we’ve all been talking about how egregious these cases are after people are treating. So there are heated air device which you have to be three or older to use. It’s a good process. It’s expensive, but and that’s a professional treatment. There are enzyme treatments. There’s olive oil or conditioner and a knit comb. I’ve tried it all. I come from a I was a pastry chef and I worked in a busy kitchen so it was all about the process and being efficient and being proud to go, so I developed a practical, efficient process. My key ingredient in my product is domestic cone, and the key to domestic cone. And there are products that you can get over the counter. But it’s hard to find. So look for the word dynamic code that will kill the bugs. And that’s what we want. And then with my process that I developed, I, it’s done specifically so that people can be a professional service on their own. There’s a built in safety net, because we’re so conditioned to get every last nit out. And the only reason in my process that you want to get the nits out, you’re going to end the cycle with three total treatments. The first one being the big one. With any process, the first treatments, the big one, the two follow up once treatments are done perfectly timed with a window of two to three days in the process of the lifecycle so that we’re ending the life cycle. After that life cycle is over. The only nits that are left behind are the knits that we’re not going to hatch 10% of them don’t. Yeah, and then hatched knits are still on the hair shaft, and they don’t come out by themselves, they grow out. Okay, so if you have any length of hair, the only reason why you want to get them app is you don’t want to have a false positive. By seeing it, that is not viable anymore. And it is confusing, because if you’ve gotten it, it could be in your circles, therefore, you may have been re exposed, which can happen. I do like to tell people after they leave the salon because they feel like they’re walking right back into the lion’s den, you don’t typically get it that quickly, even though you can paint the scenario that it’s coming back. So quick, you’re not going to get it that we typically don’t get it back that quickly. But you can get it within the next month to three months. So just be on top of those head checks. But the process that I developed I feel like is is while there are processes out there. There’s good processes and not great processes, I built in a safety net, so that I was putting something out there that was the most effective and I did it just for my community, where I have a really strong reputation. And then I went on Amazon. So now I have a bigger community that can’t just come into the salon, I wanted to make sure that I cover every single base that if you do this, and you follow directions, you will not have lice at the end. But we can’t control what other people are doing. So do those type checks till they leave for college.
CRISTINA ROSE 17:48
Love it, Well, Eileen, it was such an honor to dive into that part of our episode. And now it’s time for the Power Mom Chronicles and I cannot wait to figure out what your answers are
And my first one is what’s a game changing lesson life has taught you.
EILEEN STEINBERG 18:08
So, for me, coming from learning differences, where people didn’t know about what they were all about when I was a kid is school is not a determination of the person is smart. It just means that you can take you can pay attention in class and know what to answer on a test or how to study. We all have our gifts and interests are unique, and how we as an individual see the world, I have something called Disk calculus. So not only could I not read that I didn’t know the value of numbers. So I didn’t know if three o’clock was later or earlier than four o’clock or if a dime was more than a quarter. It was very hard for me beyond right and left, it was very hard to discern what’s close and near. Because it all made sense to me. I just didn’t have a definition for it. However, I was a great athlete. And I could fix things innately I just understood how things worked. But that wasn’t celebrated when I was a kid. So it was a real struggle. becoming an adult and learning these lessons as I got older. So for my kids, I learned through them, how to pay attention to who they were and what they were interested in. And I have two kids that are great at school. And I have two kids that are very creative and great at other things.
CRISTINA ROSE 19:39
Yeah, we all learn differently and the school system definitely keeps a very rigid, structured, you know, way of learning and how they like the measure like success and I put that in air quotes. And then my second question is reflecting on your journey, what plaque practical lessons or insights can our listeners apply? to improve their own lives.
EILEEN STEINBERG 20:03
So as a single mother of four, and a business owner 98% of what we worry about doesn’t have to happen the way you play it out in your head. So take each moment and handle it. And what I’ve learned is to treat worry as a positive, it’s a positive way to show that I really care about the outcome, and not as a negative, which can get in the way of thinking positively to have a good outcome.
CRISTINA ROSE 20:37
That’s beautifully said, I love that. And then offer a piece of wisdom for moms, or anyone really striving to find their strength and voice.
EILEEN STEINBERG 20:47
Listen to your intuition and trust it. If you hear that little voice in your head telling you something, follow up on it. If it’s not an issue, then at least you have peace of mind that you know, you looked at it. But at the same time, you just be grateful in your thought processes. And I can’t tell you how many people say I thought my kid had lice. And I checked and here it is. And, you know, we have, especially as moms, such a strong intuition thing chemically, we almost are in sync with our kids in certain ways that you can sense things. So you know, just pay attention to your inner voice and, and give it respect.
CRISTINA ROSE 21:41
And the best advice you’ve ever received.
EILEEN STEINBERG 21:44
I love this. Because when my daughter was in preschool, she had a little person in her class that was hansy and had a lot of energy. And they brought in a book called bucket filler. And the bucket filler is such a wonderful concept. If you do nice things for people, you’re filling their bucket. And when you fill somebody else’s bucket, you’re filling your own, because you feel good, because you’ve helped somebody or have done something to help your community. But if you do on the reverse of that if you do something not nice to somebody, or you don’t help, you’re a bucket Dipper, huh. So that was 20. That was okay. My daughter’s 21 She was four. So all those years ago, I have kind of lived in that mindset of, I want to be a bucket filler, I want to help people I want to help my community. And at the end of the day, if I could just smile at somebody when I’m walking into the why or into the market and just leave that person with that smile. I filled their bucket which made me feel good. So just be a bucket filler and find that book. It’s wonderful.
CRISTINA ROSE 23:07
I love it. Well what a great way to end this week’s episode of “Not Your Momma’s Podcast”. All of her links are down below in the show notes. Don’t be shy. Go say hi, and I hope to see you all in the next one. Thanks for listening.
EILEEN STEINBERG 23:19
Thank you, Christina. This was great.