2 yr old mixing up red and green: colour blindness?

[comebacksummer]

My Dd2 has just turned 2. She knows all her colours very well, including subtle ones like brown, pink, purple etc, but she persistently mixes up green and red. I didn't think anything of it until a friend said that it might be a sign of colour blindness... does anyone have any experience of this, and if so, what should I do? Thanks

colour blindedness is a sex linked trait - only males can be colour blind. females can carry the gene and pass it on, but can't be colour blind.
and at this age it's just an age thing I would have thought!

My son mixed up colours. When the health visitor did his check she gave him a pile of red and green blocks and asked him to make a pile of each colour. She deduced from that that he wasn't colour blind.

My dd is 2. She knows pink, purple, orange, brown and blue but muddles the more ordinary ones.

blimey hana, that was quick! Is that a medical fact? If so I shall stop worrying.. thanks so much

Not true, females can get colour blindness just much less often than males
If she is very confident in her colours otherwise then it may well be CB.
Ask HV for an orthoptic check, takes very little time as they super impose things red on green familiar shapes etc.
I know this how?
Because my best friends two daughters are colourblind as is their mum.

crocodileKate- that's the problem: today I gave her multicoloured bricks to sort and she got every single pile right (yellow, blue, pink, grey, purple, black) except the red and green which were muddled in together. Now I don't know if she's doing this deliberately because she knows I get worried ( she is a little madam!! ) or whether there's a real problem.

Girls can be colour blind, but only if their fathers are colour blind and their mothers carry the defective gene!

Piffle, thanks.. what impact does it have on their lives? Does it affect development/ eyesight? I think I will get her tested as she is certain on her colours otherwise and has known them since about 18 months so this isn't a recently learnt thing

We were convinced ds2 was colour blind (it runs in our family)- took him till almost 4 to really know his colours - but hes not he was just slow to learn them. It seems really strange when they can do letters and shapes etc but development is a complicated process. Two is very early to be worrying about colourblindness I think.

MamaA I agree she's very young to worry, and I wasn't until my friend mentioned Cb- the thing is she doesn't mix up any other two colours, and is so certain of them all- never makes mistakes unless it's red and green. It's obviously a subject of some contention though seeing the different answers so far!

sorry, to add, neither DP nor I are colourblind- nor, as far as I know, are our parents

my exmotherinlaw is actually colour blind and obviously shes female

genes are a complicated thing - if it was easy to predict who'd be colourblind acurately then they wouldn't test us all at school would they?

I wouldn't worry yet but if she has the communication skills to understand a test then do it to ease your mind. We're having similar issues with DS but at the moment I'm hoping he's still learning and will get it eventually.

If they are colourblind there are certain careers (eg electrician, pilot) that may be affected and they may be more likely to make a fashion faux pas but most people I know with it get on just fine

My brother is colour blind and went to a specialist about getting contact lenses to correct it. He tried it for a day and HATED it! He said the world was to weird and garish and he liked his version 'better'

I didn't know you could 'correct' colour blindness .. how fascinating

I think its probably too early to tell .. there's an online test someone posted ages ago about colour blindness

Genes are complicated, but afaik, the genes for colour-blindness aren't. For a girl to be colourblind, as spagblog says, her mum would have to be a carrier (e.g. her dad colourblind) and her dad would have to be colourblind.

For a boy to be colourblind, he just has to have a mum who is a carrier (and a bit of bad luck).

I know my boys have a 50/50 chance of being colourblind (my dad is), and DS1 absolutely is - but we only bothered doing the test when he was nearly 5, as his colours were muddled before then.

Here is the pediatric colourblindness test I used.

thanks nqc- i just looked at the test and unfortunately although she knows circles and triangles she still hasn't got " square", so it should be a little tricky trying it out.. oh well, i shall try!

You could get her to point at them, I guess?

But it doesn't actually matter, iyswim. My dad was colourblind, and it caused him very little hassle. DH's dad is colourblind, and he was a research chemist, which in theory you shouldn't be able to do if colourblind, but it didn't seem to stop him.

And early diagnosis makes no difference. Your child is still colourblind, whenever you diagnose them.

I was a little worried my ds was colour blind earlier in the year and spoke to my hv about it. She told me just to take him to an opticians where they could test him but I never got round to it and now im pretty sure he's fine. He knew all his colours but always muddled up green and yellow and got confused sorting blocks etc but then all of a sudden got it. Think he just had a bit of a mental block for a while but has got over it now.

My DS1 is colour blind. I had my suspicions and it was confirmed during an opticians visit when he was about 5. Apparently, so the optician told me, they do not diagnose colour blindness until that age.

As NotQuiteCockney says, whether you diagnose now or when she is 5 makes no difference. Colour blindness wont cause her any problems between now and then anyway.