I don&#x27;t have any problem differentiating left from right, but I do have very clear memories of learning the concepts as a child, and coincidentally, I learned them through visualization.  Also, they were definitely two distinct concepts - I internalized &quot;left&quot; some time before &quot;right&quot;.  I&#x27;m not sure how long, since I was like 4-5 years old at the time, but I&#x27;m going to guess on the order of a month.<p>Anyway, I learned left because one time we were walking down a specific street by our house - coincidentally on the way to a beach - and I guess I was asked to walk on the left side of the road or something.  For some reason, I knew which side was the left at that time.  So from then on, any time I had to know which was was left, I would just pull up a mental picture of that street, and then know that side was left.<p>What&#x27;s interesting is, I definitely didn&#x27;t use the same picture for right.  I don&#x27;t remember why, but I remember that some time later, my &quot;right&quot; reference became a mental image of the swimming pool where I was taking swimming lessons.  I was at the edge of the pool looking out, and somehow (I&#x27;ve forgotten how - perhaps deducing from left) I worked out which way was right.  So from then on I would visualize that view out of the pool to know which way was right.<p>IIRC I did it consciously for a period of time, then it would happen automatically, and at some point between then and adulthood the crutch faded away and I automatically knew left and right like most people.  (I have no memory of how long that took, but it probably was still as a young child.)<p>Anyway, aside from whatever general interest that story might have, I wonder whether a similar technique would work for your wife?  Pick a specific mental picture to associate with &quot;left&quot;, then spend some time intentionally pulling it up whenever leftness needs to be ascertained.  Then once it&#x27;s cemented, do a different one for right.