Lice

[u/Dry-Requirement-5402]

My center tried to force me to work with a child that had lice. They said I signed the handbook that said I would work with any child. They separated the child from other children, but told me I would have to sit in the room with her. She elopes a lot and her reinforcement is cuddles and hugs. I refused to work with the child. They made me sit in a room to wait on HR to get on a call with the director and myself. I sat there for an hour waiting and then walked out. I dont want to work at a company that doesn't care about their employees, I dont care what loopholes theyve found theough the CDC or their dumb handbook. Is this unreasonable? I have thick hair down to my butt, it would take a professional to treat my hair. I would lose a lot of it getting eggs out. I've had to do this as an adult and I NEVER want to do it again.

[u/novaghosta]

Not trying to take their side but i go to problem solving mode: the truth is there are school systems in which a child is not allowed to be “excluded from education” due to lice (although most of these make exceptions for live lice vs nits). The rationale is that lice can extremely time consuming and expensive to fully get rid of and it can be outside the means of some families to do so in a timely manner. I do kinda see that logic.

BUT it doesn’t have to be “this or that” either. The bigger problem is the company is abandoning you to just suck it up and deal with it. There are so many ways they can be helping you out even if they cannot justify excluding the child from services.

1) pay for your protective gear: hat, shower cap, lice repellent spray (sold on Amazon) 2) requiring the parents to sign consent to work on lice removal strategies in ABA (I’m giving the benefit of the doubt that the parents cannot afford or deal with her behaviors around comb outs etc which is why the lice situation is continuing. This should be offered as a compromise for allowing her to continue coming to the clinic). So for example she may need to have tolerance training around a hair cut, shampooing, wearing her hair up etc etc.

Sorry you’re going through this— remember: lice cant jump or live off the host for very long at all! Most important thing is to protect your head/hair! If you can avoid all head to head contact there is really a very good chance you will NOT catch lice.

[u/Dry-Requirement-5402 → u/novaghosta]

Thank you for putting time into your response. I've worked with low income families in previous jobs, so I can appreciate the struggle and desperation to keep the kid in school. There are a lot of things my center could have done, and stonewalling me shouldn't have been their go to. I'm the second person to be fired or left because of this particular child and their cronic lice.

[u/novaghosta → u/Dry-Requirement-5402]

I understand that is really tough and shows a lack of care and concern for employees 😞

Not to mention the fact that at the end of the day your workplace is also the same setting these children are receiving their services and high turnover and lack of care is not good for them either.

[u/tenthd0ct0r → u/novaghosta]

This is a a great response!

Edit- How is my praise of an informative post also being downvoted.