New driver - scratched someone's car. I hate driving. Does it get better?

[igatedriving5]

I was doing the school run, a huge van came down the road full of kids (childminder) a woman was parked to my left and cars behind me. I couldn't reverse so try to go forward a bit and the lady parked stares at me. I realise what must have happened It was very small I didn't even hear it. I was going super slow. It's scratched her paint but nothing hugely serious and I've agreed to pay for the damage.

I'm trying to reverse out the way of traffic to speak to her and have severe anxiety and I'm struggling. Someone's dad decides to make comments. Traffic behind is still there when I'm doing my best in such a shit situation and I can't parallel park in due to being terrified of damaging the ladies car again. The guy had no relation to my knowledge to the situation and should have just walked off home and not involved himself.

The lady and her child go to my child's school. I felt so bad for her if I'm honest as that would ruin anyones morning.

I've never had a problem doing the school run before. That road is so narrow and honestly I'm shocked a van even attempted to drive down it at 9am. But I'm more shocked at my misjudgement and don't blame anyone but myself.

I hate driving and honestly don't want to anymore. I've had my licence less than 6 months and had no end of horrid behaviour when I had my P plates. I took those off and it's been better but then this happens and I just feel so low about it. I'm also 6 months pregnant and so hugely emotional on top. I never even want to go back to my child's school

I’m the same with driving. When I was pregnant I had a huge accident too which made me worse. I can only suggest you stick at it and keep practicing.

Sending you a hug 🫂 give yourself a break, that all sounds so stressful. You did the best you could in the situation.
Driving is tough, especially when you're a new driver. Keep going. Things get easier over time as you gain more experience

That sounds awful, sending you a very unMN hug.

It does get better, I promise - I’ve been driving for 15 years and even I would struggle in the situation you describe.

Be extra kind to yourself today and then keep at it x

I was always seeing minor mishaps on the school run. Do you have to go down that road - can you park in the next road over where is might not be so busy and walk?

The only way to get more confident in driving is to keep driving. Experience counts for a lot when needing to judge situations and anticipate what might happen. It's obviously your decision, but having got to the stage of being able to pass your test, I would persevere. Driving is such a useful to skill to have and it' worth keeping it up.

Of all the driving I do, I find the school run the most stressful. Lots of cars. Lots of pedestrians. Lots of poorly/inconsiderately parked people. Tight on time.

I would have found that situation really stressful OP and I have been driving nearly 20 years. Please persevere it does get better!

Ah, it happens to everyone. I had a school run exactly like that, same sort of scenario and I clipped a parked car’s wing mirror. Parked up and walked back and the woman was vile to me - even though I was really apologetic and actually no damage done as it popped back.

Try to put it behind you. There honestly are worse things and no one will remember it as much as you will!

Have a nice cup of tea & chill out a bit.

I've been driving over 30 years and have driven all over the work, everything from
Moped to large trucks, big busy cities and incredibly rural areas. Snow,sand,ice, thunderstorms.

I'd take any of those over many school runs!! It's chaos of the worst kind!! My friend is a taxi driver, background in cars/motorbikes and he could make a good portion of money he needs each week on a school run, but chooses not to anymore because he hates doing them.

How did you get her there before you got your licence??

Can you walk instead?
Can you drive part park & walk the rest?

Build up your confidence driving to other places that are less stressful. You'll appreciate having the car, so don't stop driving.

As for the scratch, yes, I'd have been annoyed, but you're going to pay for the repair, so that's just life. Don't worry about seeing her in future or going to school- we've nearly all done something embarrassing at one time or another!!

Thank you everyone.

I walked before but my pregnancy makes that difficult. It's a long walk up a hill. I just can't imagine doing it and not wanting to cry.

I actually arrive at the school 15 minutes early to avoid the drama of the school run. I've never had a single issue leaving previously but this time I suppose the child minder was either late or in a hurry and felt that was the best route and didn't even attempt to reverse to help. My parking isn't the best due to being quite new and getting the hang of things.

I find the school run the worst though, everyone parks everywhere and nobody seems to care how their parking impacts others. They then drive erratic and on two occasions I've had people park so close to my bumper I've struggled to get out and had to wait for them to move. It almost feels intentional.

I park around the corner from the school itself so I'm not in the middle of it all as it is.

I am very embarrassed as well because that one dude made it so much worse and more noticeable to everyone around us. There were also peoples kids walking around so I was trying to keep everyone safe.

Just an awful awful morning

What car do you drive and do you need to have that model? A different body type and driver position can make a massive difference. I’m so glad that my first car after learning to drive was a Smart Fortwo - small, narrow, easily manoevreable, the front is the front and the back is the back and neither are very far away from your seat! A friend who recently passed her test is having to get to grips with being a new driver in the family SUV and hates if because it’s just so big and unwieldy.

please don't beat yourself up about this. you are going to pay for the damage and thats that. it could have been worse - you could have plowed straight into the side of her.

I only passed my test in sept last year and i drove through a parking space (rather than reverse into it because i hate reversing) and there was a post with a kind of metal framing around it. i saw the post and that i was clear of the post but i didn't notice the metal framing around it - its pointless metal bars stuck about 2 feet out the ground. anyway i drove into the metal bar and broke the left side of my bumper and in the process cracked my screenwash bottle too. how on earth it did that much damage when i was obviously going less than 10mph i don't know.

luckily my dad managed to sort the bumper so it looks presentable until i buy a new one and i managed to buy a new water bottle on ebay and had the local garage fit it for just labour charge

we all make silly mistakes and call ourselves a bloody stupid woman but its life

Poor you, OP . Don’t listen to comments from others. If you have an accident, there are systems in place to resolve it (swap numbers and insurance details, and get on with your day).

When you feel intimidated by other drivers, concentrate on driving safely. You wouldn’t have passed your test if you didn’t have a sound knowledge of how to drive, including the theory. I drive a little car, and DH is always shocked by the tailgating, performance overtaking and chancers pulling out in front that he gets when driving it - why people see litlle cars as a provocation, I have no idea, but you have to stick to driving safely yourself.

Finally, adopt some coping mechanisms for now and for when baby arrives. Maybe park somewhere easier and walk the last bit. I also put my windows down and turn the radio off when driving around narrow roads near school. For parallel parking, I take my time and about 300 goes to get in.

I am very anxious and cautious about driving but did a pass plus course ten years ago that really gave me confidence. After having my children, I also did a bit of practice of regular routes with DH in the passenger seat.

Good luck with all of it

Can you describe a bit better how this happened. If you were driving along with cars behind you and the large van was coming towards you I’m presuming that it was one of those cases where the road was too narrow for you and the van to pass side-by-side. In that situation the idea is that one of them pulls into a space at the side of the road to let the other pass. However that requires a bit of advance planning and you can often each be assuming the other will pull in but neither does and one of you ends up having to reverse. But you can’t reverse if there is a car behind you. If you both have cars behind you then it’s tricky, and one of you may need to get out of your car and talk to the driver(s) behind you to get them to move back, or fold in a wing mirror and ask someone to guide you through the narrow space. The trick is to stay calm and not let an aggressive oncoming driver force you to do something risky. I’d argue that a driver if a big vehicle should take extra care to make sure they anticipate very carefully and pull in to let people pass, but they can be bullies. In future try to pull in whenever you can if you are on a road too narrow for side-by-side passing and you see a vehicle in the distance. It’s very stressful and school runs are the worst for it. I’m sorry that the man stuck his nose in and made you feel worse, instead of helping you.

Ugh I've been driving for over 20 years and the school run still fills me with dread because the roads are so narrow.

Stop.

The school run sucks monkeys balls traffic wise. This shit could have happened to anyone.

Why don't you for the minute, park a little distance away and walk in? Just until you've built up you confidence up a bit. But sadly you'll always need nerves of steel doing the school run.

I feel for you. When my dd was in Reception I was parallel parking into a space on the school run, when out of nowhere a car came right up behind me that I didn't see in the blind spot, and I hit it on my reverse manouevre. Got out to speak to the driver - all the parents looking as they walked past - and when I got back in, dd said 'Mummy why were you talking to XX's daddy?'. I hadn't realised he was the dad of her friend . These things are what they are - accidents.

Keep driving!

Get yourself some more lessons , it will give you some confidence . In the meantime park further away and walk the last bit .

School runs are always torturous, no matter how good a driver you are.

Park further away, go extra early or pick up a bit late once all the super keens have gone and left plenty of spaces.

Thank you everyone. It's been a few hours and im a little calmer. Still very upset and dreading the school run as that nosy little man will be there to stick his two cents in. Unsure if he has hobbies but his inability to mind his own business suggests not.

Just to reiterate - I park as far away as possible without going into a main road to park. It is a very built up area with a lot of cars already parked from home owners and such. I use a parking space that is quite large and away from most of the busyness of the school run and have never parked close to the school. I arrive early to ensure I get this space to avoid any situations where parking could be problematic and put anyone in a tizzy including myself. I did my best to avoid it, where I parked was not the issue.

Parking has been an issue for the school as a whole but wasn't my issue today. The issue today was just a difficult situation I misjudged. The school now has a traffic warden and I noticed a sign requesting people park respectfully that looked very new. They're aware of the situation re parking but what can they do.

This situation with the scrape happened trying to get home for my work shift. The street itself was up a hill, with no room for two cars due to cars parking to my left. To my right was a huge field with wooden boundary guard type things around it. The van came around a corner as I was doing so, I could not see them but was being very slow, less than 10pms. As soon as I saw them I paused, looked behind me to see if reversing was the best option. It wasn't. There was a pavements to my left behind the lady who I scraped but children walk up and down it. I genuinely would never attempt to squeeze in in case a child ran into the spot. When I was trying to move out of the way of traffic behind, a child did indeed walk into that spot and I chose to instead not go fully into it and the lady I had scraped guided me forward to help me stay clear of traffic. At this point I was a bit of an emotional wreck and my priority was keeping everyone safe so just wanted to allow cars to pass and get the situation as resolved as it could be.

The van who came toward me remained stationary and did not move until I tried to move forward and squeeze between them and the car. It was my only option I felt but I was panicking due to the situation. They could have reversed as there was no one behind them. They chose not to and once my situation was apparent drove around me and left? At this point the scrape had happened and I was attempting to reverse as the cars behind had moved backwards.

I've had many meeting situations prior to this and have never had one so difficult or stressful. I've had one where there was an AO delivery driver in similar circumstances and we both did our best to ensure everyone was safe. Not a single scrape.

I do agree the school run is horrific and it shows how selfish and unreasonable people can be when driving. I've seen people block entire roads for no reason other than to save a few minutes.

I work full time and get the urgency but for god sake urgency isn't worth an accident.

I won't be paying for more lessons as I don't think they're needed. I'm not a bad driver I just hate driving now. I passed with very few minors and have had no issues beside a scrape so I am not concerned about my ability just about my feelings regarding driving itself. I find a lot of road users are so abusive and cruel for the sake of it even when they're at fault. I've had friends tell me similar stories and even got told of a woman faking whip last after they bumped at 5mph.

I've spent a fair whack on learning to drive and now wonder if a chauffeur would be less money, time and stress 😂

Thank you everyone for the kind words. It has helped

The confidence will come with the more experience you get 👍🏼

Sounds like an unfortunate combination of circumstances. You said that the van came round a corner so possibly even though you could see from your angle that the road behind the van was clear, the driver didn’t feel they could reverse as something else might come around the corner and bump into them? Either that or just a bully. I guess the safest solution would have been to get out of your car and help guide the van to reverse, but people rarely get out of cars in these situations and prefer just to beep and gesticulate unreasonably!

It’s perhaps not massively unreasonable that it just drive round you and left after you were able to reverse out of the way- they would have had kids in there to be dropped off and it was only a scrape, with plenty of other witnesses.

All you can do is chalk it up to experience. I started a new school run back in September and I am rapidly acquiring a long list of sections/junctions that I avoid or drive differently now, having had a bad experience on them at some point.