Why don't you drive. ?

[Fivetillmidnight]

So many posts here from women with various issues , (mostly logistical) with an 'aside' of ... 'dp/DH drives I don't '.

AIBU to suggest that IF you have a car in the family ... AND you have at least one functioning eye, and either feet or hands that work well and no reason that the DVLA would ban you from driving for , then you should learn ?

My moderate/severe categorised Dss has just passed his test. ( well done him !) with the help of Motorbility . Surely if he can do it then there is no excuse not to learn ? and relieve the burden for a family where one is the sole driver (normally the man) .

But equally applicable to a family where the women does all the transportation.

Obviously not an issue for those who don't need a car. This refers to those where a car is used for the family and one adult does ALL the driving .

I drive but I don't think anyone should learn if they don't want to. Plus there's plenty of men who are backseat drivers which make driving miserable for women that can drive so often they don't bother if the man is going to be in the car anyway. Like someone else said, it's really none of your business. It's personal choice not statutory.

I rarely drive. I have a history of epilepsy (clear for ten years now, full licence) so I and my partner (who drives) live in an area where I can live with public transport and taxis. A couple of years ago I made a big effort had refresher lessons drove a fair bit, but I still have a bit of anxiety and little need to drive. I do feel judged and my medical history is no one's business and isn't widely known.

For fucks sake OP, are you being deliberately obtuse?

It can cost a fortune for people to learn to drive. I learned later in life, in my early thirties. It cost me £50 for a double lesson once a week, and I was lucky it only took 3 months to pass my test.
That's completely out of reach for some people. Don't be a dick.

These sort of threads are usually started by, then populated by, people who were bought a bank of lessons and driving test for their 17th Birthday then had a parent with a car they could practice in. Not everyone has these privileges.

Mind your own bloody business.

I drive. If we go any distance my DH drives. He's the better driver and enjoys it. I don't.

I would never have taught any of my DC to drive as I wouldn't have done a good enough job. For a lot of people there isn't someone capable of teaching in the family and lessons are expensive.

People do what suits them.

And what's it to you anyway?

@Fivetillmidnight

YANBU.

I think if someone has a good valid reason for not learning (like genuine health reason or absolutely terrified to,) then fine. But those who just can't be bothered, and depend on/rely on lifts from others, really irk me.

A few non-drivers are OK, but many of them are quite entitled, and think people should go out of their way to fetch and carry them (and their kids sometimes.) Some (not all) non-drivers are rather entitled and thoughtless, and fail to fathom why drivers don't want to be their personal chauffeur.

I know this sounds dramatic, but this was a dealbreaker for me when looking for a partner (when I was much younger,) and it probably would be now (if me and DH split and I was looking for a new man!) I could never be with a man who plain and simple refused to drive.

DH could drive when we met (30 years back,) and I passed 2 years after meeting him.

He does probably 70% of the driving now, and I do 30% of it (when we are together.) But he doesn't mind driving more, and I don't mind him driving more either. If he wanted to make it 50-50, I would also be OK with that.

Thing is, DH has had around half a dozen occasions where he couldn't drive, over the 30 years we have been together. Several times, he was laid up after having an operation, and he has also had a couple of minor accidents.

When he was laid up, I was able to step up and take over, and be the 'family driver' for the two to three months needed. If I had not been able to drive, our family would have really struggled, and would have spent a SHITLOAD of money on taxis.

We have also been able to take it in turns when driving our DC here and there (when they were younger.) I would take them and he would get them back. We have also been able to share the driving when we are on very long drives (like driving to the South of France/Northern Spain.)

When DC were at uni, both were 140 to 180 miles away, and we shared the driving when going to take them/fetch them back. No way would I have wanted to have been the ONLY driver, and had to do it ALL.

I could never be in a relationship with someone who couldn't be fucked to learn to drive.

Also, how do people cope when they have to go to hospitals that are quite far away, or specialists, and various clinics that are in another town? Unless you live 5 minutes walk from a bus stop or train station that goes everywhere you want/need to go, and you can afford the exorbitant train fares, you are going to have huge problems getting about.

Even when our kids went to college, it was an hour and a half by bus, or 10-12 minutes in the car! Ludicrous. We used to take them and fetch them back most of the time. They would have wasted SO much of their life if they had gone there and back by bus. 3 hours a day travelling to college and back (by bus,) instead of 25 minutes there and back (in the car.) Ludicrous!

Also, DH used to work in a job (for 7 years) that had differing shifts. Half the time he finished at midnight or 6am. Not a single bus then. He could not get there and back with no car. It was 15 miles away, and a mix of country lanes and main A-road. No way in hell would be able to cycle the route.

The days of people living within a mile of their workplace, all their family, all their mates, all the pubs, the doctors, the dentists, the hairdressers, the opticians, the hospital, the bookies, the local street market, every shop they need, and a main bus route, are long gone!

Being able to drive is fairly essential (in my opinion,) and it's very foolish to actively choose to not do it.

I take the children to all their activities on foot

And when they want to do something that's too far to walk, then what ?

I have a driving dh, we own a car called Bob an old banger. DH works from home, most days and commutes by train when he doesn't. I commute by train to work. The kids walk to school. DH drives mostly short journeys a few times a week.

I don't drive, I am pretty confident I would be a poor driver. I have extremely poor spatial awareness, two of our children are autistic, one also is dyspraxic and has ADD, I think the fact that I am one of 6 children and only one of my siblings has learned to drive is not coincidental. I think DH would sometimes like me to drive, I would like it if DH could cook. Sucks to be us.

I feel it is only necessary to justify my lack of a driving licence to DH, and occasionally to prospective employers. To curious strangers on the internet, I say, when I sit in a car I barely tolerate being there, counting the minutes til I can get out. I walk, train, bus wherever/ whenever possible. I bloody hate cars, observing the behaviour of drivers, the impatience, the waste of fossil fuels, the environmental impact, the sheer inefficiency of thousands of individual vehicles heading in the same direction morning and evening... weird. But that's just an opinion.

Dulci I'm rural England, and your experience from across the pond is far more familiar to me than someone only as far as London. With a few exceptions, if you don't drive round here, you don't work. Rarer still if it's not very low paid work.

I'd also guess that there's not much difference here between the cost of running a car, and expensive public transport for a family. Especially if you factor in the unpaid time saved, access to shopping, and greater opportunities for work and education.

One eye doesn’t necessarily mean you can drive. My DH has only one eye (other is glass) and the strain from only having the use of one eye means his vision is not good enough in the remaining eye to drive. Therefore I’m the driver and do sometimes wish my DH could also drive to ease the responsibility on me and so we could share the driving. Having 3 kids with clubs to go to etc often means I’m ferrying everyone around, dropping DH and DS at football then going back to sort DD’s. Saying all of this I think of my DH did drive then I wouldn’t have learned how to drive and would have relied on him as I only drive because it’s convenient for family life, I don’t enjoy it and would much rather walk if I can. I still walk my kids to school in the rain etc and find it much more relaxing than driving x

@IheartNiles

These sort of threads are usually started by, then populated by, people who were bought a bank of lessons and driving test for their 17th Birthday then had a parent with a car they could practice in. Not everyone has these privileges.

Utter crap.

Not a SINGLE person I know - or have ever known - had this happen. Everyone had a job, and paid for their own bloody lessons!

@ThomasShelbysBunnet

It can cost a fortune for people to learn to drive. I learned later in life, in my early thirties. It cost me £50 for a double lesson once a week, and I was lucky it only took 3 months to pass my test. That's completely out of reach for some people. Don't be a dick.

And yet somehow, many many people learn to drive. And very few people can afford it. Saying 'I cannot afford it' is an excuse, usually made by the 'entitled brigade' who will cadge lifts off anyone and everyone, because they 'can't afford to learn to learn to drive' themselves. Quite happy to take lifts off people who have spent money learning though (and also spending money running their car!)

As I say, MOST people cannot afford to pay for lessons, so that excuse is utter bollocks.

I feel the same way, OP. Yet I still don't drive. Car in the garage, money for lessons, no real reason. Except that I've tried. Took lessons for a year - the instructor kept shaking his head. Said he did not see me as ever having the confidence to pass.

I am a nervous passenger, a more nervous driver. I can't quite figure out where the traffic is going to come from at intersections, and often can't see well enough to know what is going on up ahead. I have on more than one occasion made guesses as to what happens next, and been wrong. If I were in the driving seat, we'd be dead. I also have no sense of direction, and get more flustered by that. All in all, nope, driving is not for me.

I am mortified that I still can't drive, and now feel I am too old to start again, but still. It doesn't quite feel like a choice for me - more that I don't have the skills to do it. As a professional, very capable woman that makes me look and sound ridiculous, but it is what it is.

I am happy to take cabs/ubers/buses, trains - and to walk. But I do feel constantly 'less than' by not being able to just hop in the car that is sitting right there.

I’m with the OP on this one. I would never be in a relationship with someone who couldn’t drive, it’s a right pita. Non drivers usually have no concept of putting other people out for lifts etc too

I don’t drive because I don’t want to (didn’t say can’t). We live in an area with good public transport links, walking distance to schools, shops, friends, pubs. I can work public transport, as can my DC, so we get around easily. My OH drives to work, don’t really use the car much apart from that. Seriously p’d off at being judged for making a good environmental decision! Seriously, save your vitriol for something that actually impacts you.

I would never be in a relationship with someone who couldn’t drive
So you would break up with someone if they lost the ability to drive?

Some people (like me) just aren't meant to be drivers. It's not laziness, it's fear on my behalf. I've had lessons in the past and just cant do it in moderate to heavy traffic.
My dh loves driving and is very happy with the situation. He hates to be driven.
I don't want to drive, he does. Why should that matter to you?

Because I'm dyspraxic as hell. Do you really want me to spell out exactly what it means in words of 1 syllable?
Yeah, I've tried. For 4 sodding years. And 4 years of constant driving lessons get pretty damn expensive, I can assure you.

Thankfully I've lost a fair whack of my peripheral vision now for an entirely different reason. I'm sure if I tried to renew my provisional licence the DVLA would have quite a lot to say about me.
I've got both a blue badge and a freedom pass because my vision is so shite. A car for me would be nothing more than a killing machine.

Care leaver - no one to teach me aged 17 or pay for lessons. I did have a part-time job but that paid for more essential and pressing items like train fares for uni interviews and food at weekends.

During my student years I was trying to keep afloat financially - no sare cash for learning to drive. In my twenties I was busy working full time and building a career. I worked a weekend job as well to save up a house deposit (obviously no family to help with money or practicalities such as subsidised lodgings at home or a car to practise in). In my thirties I was busy with young children - less money and time for learning to drive. Now in my forties I have been learning for three years. I practise in the family car when the children are at school. I have spent thousands on lessons and have failed three tests. Perhaps it is easier to learn when young and fearless. Perhaps I will get there one day or perhaps at some point I will cut my losses and give up. But the disdain on here for non-drivers is quite rude - there are a hundred reasons, and perhaps in the end it would be better for the world if fewer people drove.

Non drivers usually have no concept of putting other people out for lifts etc too

Oh I know. In fact I'm on your doorstep right now waiting for you to run me down to Tesco.

squeekums personally, no, not if it was health or disability related. Otherwise, yes. I'm not prepared to live in a city or large town, and I certainly wouldn't be willing to financially support a partner that wasn't working, or ferry them around because they couldn't be bothered to learn.

I got as far as a driving test around ten years ago.

The only lessons/instructor available in the timeslot the OH was likely to be home and prepared to look after the kids as long as he didn't have a better offer and just didn't turn up, saying any instructor will put a baby and six year old in the back so I was making excuses were two hour lessons. Sixty quid a time. Non refundable.

The insurance was £1800 for a new driver in a Mini. Plus tax. Plus parking. And putting petrol in it. The alternative vehicle would have been a 2 litre Alfa Romeo with a bucket seat I couldn't see over the steering wheel of. The owner refused to let me adjust the seat. When trying to drive the Mini, his favourite thing was to wait until I was in the middle of a really busy, multiple entry point, staggered junction in the pissing rain and start screaming at me to GO GO GO FOR FUCK'S SAKE GO, whilst keeping the windows shut and smoking a spliff. With the kids in the back.

Then there was the licence cost, the theory test cost, the test cost and car hire cost. Contact lenses because I couldn't see enough with the reduced field of vision from glasses.

If I were to try again now, we'd have to buy an electric car, as the penalties for having an older vehicle in our area aren't just the Low Emissions one for London as a whole, the council add extra punitive charges for parking as a resident. There isn't anywhere to charge an electric car where we live and you can't park outside the house and run a cable out a window. And I'd have to try to find an instructor available at the weekend, as I work - to just about cover the rent and bills.

DP hates driving in London anyway. So he doesn't.

Add to all that the fact that people drive like cunts and, even before the little problem of medical issues and I'm not doing it.

Really can't afford it. Yes I know in the long term it would be worth it but we always just about get to payday on a prayer, cannot save. I love my partner dearly but would find learning with him extremely difficult.

I can drive. I choose not to. I haven't got behind the wheel of a car for nearly 30 years.

Why? Because I don't want to sink all that money into merely getting from A to B and finding no joy in it. I prefer to spend my spare cash on other things. I've always owned large breed dogs, I go to the opera, I attend a Premier League football matches, I go away for breaks, I collect antiques. I couldn't enjoy any of those things if I were to run any car, and certainly not the type of car I would want to own.

It took me 3 attempts to pass my test. I hated driving; found it very stressful and haven't been behind a wheel since.

I walk or catch the bus to work. At weekends, I'll walk into the town centre or get a train to the next town.

My dp does drive. He uses his car more for work than anything else. He sometimes drives if we go out for the evening but knows that I'd be happy for us to walk or to catch a bus or train. If he prefers to drive then I'm not going to refuse to go in the car with him.

It's nothing to do with dp being a man and me being a woman. It's to do with one of us being a confident, competent driver and the other likely to be a danger on the road because they find driving stressful.

I drive and so does DH. Up until last year we a always both had cars but when I realised that his own car had done under 2000 miles in a year I knew it needed to be sold. For what we paid in insurance, tax, maintenance and fuel he could have got taxis instead!
So now we have one car and even though I have a perfectly good license and can drive, DH does almost all the driving. He prefers it and I hate driving out of town. I can drive out of town but I don't enjoy it at all. I don't need to "share the burden" and I assume couples who only have one with a license would be the same and it's up to them isn't it?