Has anyone out there got a colour blind/deficient child?

[bodiddly]

I have been told by my optician that my ds has an almost 100% chance of being colour blind/deficient as I have colour issues myself! He is 2.9 and is really struggling with colours. Has anyone else got experience of this and is there any way to help them learn their colours in a different way? My problem is just with putting names to shades of some colours not with the primary colours themselves.

My DS is colour blind, but we didn't know till he was about 5 or 6. He's 12 now. I guess he's always known what colours are called - but he's just not seeing them the same as the rest of us.

The only time it becomes apparent is when he chooses clothes in a shop. He wants to wear ones that are "sludge" coloured - but what he sees as being identical sludge coloured tops and trousers are actually hugely different shades and even sometimes different colours.

I don't think he has problems with red / green, which a lot of people have.

Did he learn his colours pretty easily when he was little? My ds is pretty bad, we point at an orange and ask him what it is and he says an orange and then when we ask what colour it is, he says green! He is pretty good with blue but that is more or less it.

I think so. It was so long ago, and we had no inclination that he would be colour blind, so we wouldn't be looking out for any problems.

Yours is still very young. Maybe it's not clicked with him yet. Does he go to nursery? They could work with him on his colours.

My ds2 is colour deficient, it was identified at his pre-school-entry eye test. Can you ask him to look at this test, which is pretty much the one that ds2 did (at 4.4 - he's now 4.10 and has started school).

There's nothing you can really do about it, I think, just let his nursery know. Our pre-school were amazed at ds2's because they had very recently assessed him as being really good at colours. Like you, it's not primary colours, but he seems to have trouble with shades of yellow and green. For example, he can tell you yellow is yellow and green is green, but if shades of both are present in a range of colours, he can't pick them out. I hope that makes sense!

i think my dd is colour blind, which is quite rare but having recently found out dh's dad is colour blind it makes sense as my dad is too!

she has a lot of problems with colours esp. red and green, and purple is non-existant its just blue.

cant really give any advice as havn't had her assessed or been bothered about it really. i know my dad has problems but they havn't affected his life so im not that bothered.

girls can be colour blind but very rarely, i had it explained properly once but all i know is that it has to be passed by both parents for a girl to get it as it is in the x chromosome so both x's need to have it iykwim.

anyway i think she has and will get her tested at some point but right now shes only 3 and it doesnt make a difference if shes tested or not, its not gunna change it!

I am probably not using the correct terminology here but years ago they used to say that men could be colour blind and women colour deficient. My father was colour blind (quite bad with most colours) and he passed that on to me making me colour deficient with shades of colours .. I am hopeless at a lot of those "find a picture in the dots tests". However, the optician said to me that the mother is the carrier so if I am colour deficient it is definite that he will be colour blind/deficient it is just a matter of whether it is mild or severe. Fingers crossed it will just be like mine which doesnt affect me at all ... I don't usually tell my clients though, seeing as I am an interior designer!

For a girl to be colour blind, her mum has to be a carrier (her dad colour blind) and her dad has to be colour-blind himself.

My DS1 is colour-blind, and my DS2 might be. Classic red/green. It's not a biggie.

At 2.9, though, colour problems are common, I wouldn't worry about it. I didn't even bother checking DS1 until he was nearly 5 (and I knew he had a 50% chance of being colour-blind).