Imagine waking up one day and seeing colors you've never seen before. Not only that, but all color is brighter and more vivid than you'd ever imagined.
That's what just happened for a 10-year-old Iowan boy. Cayson Irlbeck was born colorblind. That doesn't mean he sees the world in black and white, but that he has trouble differentiating between certain colors. Blue and purple look the same to Cayson, as do some reds and greens, his dad explained in a Facebook comment.
The colors he does see are also often dull and lifeless. "Neons are not bright and pastels look gray," his dad, Aaron Irlbeck, explained in the post.
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So when Cayson donned a pair of colorblind glasses recently, he was understandably a little overwhelmed.
“That was so amazing,” Cayson told KCCI Des Moines. “It was so colorful. It was weird (because) I had never seen those colors before, but I kind of knew what they were. I don't know. It was just awesome.”
So awesome that he almost automatically burst into tears, soon followed by dad. And, if we're being honest, it made us a little misty-eyed, too.
Cayson then showed off his cool new glasses by naming the colors of several frisbees his parents had laid on the lawn, including two different shades of blue. Overall, the $300 glasses, which Cayson found via an Internet search according to KCCI Des Moines, were totally worth it.
"The glasses help him differentiate and see color in a way he never has, although he may not see them exactly the way most of us do, even with the glasses," Aaron Irlbeck explained in the post. "Many other comments on here from people who are color "blind" (technically color deficient) explain the situation better than I can. All we know is that they work and have changed his life."