As a child, I quickly learned that my Dad + Laundry = BAD THINGS. So that left my mom, brother and I to do the household chore. Most people would assume that he just was inept or lazy, but in reality he suffers from color blindness. 

     We’ve all heard about it, or had that friend in middle school we would tease because they couldn’t tell Crayola’s Cerulean Blue from Banana Mania unless they read the wrapping. Maybe that was just me, but I digress. The definition of color blindness according to the Free Medical Dictionary is “an abnormal condition characterized by the inability to clearly distinguish different colors of the spectrum.” 

     While the range of this condition can be mild to severe, can you possibly imagine a world without distinct colors? What if everything appeared in hues of blue, green, or red? It is known by scientists that color blindness is inherited from the parents at birth, and most likely present in the X chromosome.  Even though females can be carriers of the gene, color blindness is more often suffered by men. However in the rare case that a woman is diagnosed with color blindness, she may have similar symptoms as males: red, green, or blue (the rarest form) color blindness. Yet, scientists even as recently as 2001 have yet to discover where other locations of this gene could be to trigger color blindness. Color blindness will typically be evident in both of the individual’s eyes and last their lifetime. 

     It is very unlikely that you are reading this post thinking “Oh my goodness, I’ve been color blind my whole life without knowing!” But in the off chance you are, there are some interesting diagnostic tests that can be done to prove your theory. The most widely utilized test would be by going to your standard optometrist, where he/she should offer visual tests of greens, blues, and reds. According to colourblindawareness.org, there are more “sophisticated” tests available. One being the “Lantern test,” in which certain occupations such as train engineers, pilots, or divers are required to properly read traffic lights and other colored signs for job training. There are other tests such as The Ishihara test and Titmus II Vision Tester Color Perception test to also diagnose colorblindness

     Despite medical advances in the diagnosis and understanding of color blindness, there are no treatments or cures for the color blind. However, it has been seen over the years that color blinded individuals will oftentimes use their “handicap” as an advantage though noticing everyday details. Did you know Mr. Rogers, Meat Loaf, Howie Mandel and Bing Crosby are all color blind? These celebrities didn’t let this disadvantage hinder their lives. About 8.5% of people in the US are mildly to severely colorblind living normally.