To want my partner to learn how to drive

[EllieRosesMammy]

Just that really. We have two children, another on the way. I drive, my partner doesn't. Meaning that to go anywhere everyone relies on me. I want my partner to be able to drive too so we could split the driving, especially when we go on days out because its exhausting.

He keeps saying he will learn to drive but it never happens. I've got a feeling he's really nervous about it (gave him a go of driving my car round a carpark and dear god it was awful). But everyone learning to drive is nervous surely! If he didn't spend his teen years wasting his money then maybe he would of learned to drive at 17 like the rest of us 🤦‍♀️

And it is a basic life skill / adulting 101 as far as I (and every other adult I know) is concerned.

@Herejustforthisone

“if this is true then absolutely you should not be driving- you have just admitted you are putting other lives at risk out of a selfish desire for your own convenience. I’m sure you’ll be back with another explanation of why it’s ok for you to drive while you are exhausted and unwell. I’m sure that will be a great comfort to you when you kill someone because you didn’t want to “let your car rot”.”

CHILL OUT, Love!

My husband finally learned to drive when I was in early pregnancy and I had a meltdown about the fact that he was never going to get round to it and I would have to drive myself to the hospital when I was in labour.

It's different for everyone but for me my hand eye coordination is poor, as is my spatial awareness and ability to judge speed and distance, and I still struggle with knowing my left from my right without working it out and looking at my hands.
I've thrown thousands at learning to drive, manual and automatic, and it's not the actual driving itself, it's that I can't do everything that's needed to be done in order to drive a car safely and competently quickly enough, especially around other cars. I can't ride a bike safely either.

Having grown up being mocked, belittled and shouted at for being 'cack handed' 'clumsy' 'not careful enough' 'dolly daydreamer' and other less complimentary things, I'm very, very aware of my shortcomings and have learned over the course of my life how to minimise the effects of it, it makes anything that requires coordination hard, a lot of which other people take for granted. It hurts too because you're constantly walking into things and tripping over and covered in bruises. I quite often don't react now when I bump something or collide with something because I don't want to draw attention to it because it's frustrating enough without being mocked or have someone shout at you about.
Driving is something that I just cannot crack, I don't have the resources to keep trying and failing, I'm not made of money and this has affected my life enough.
I'd be the driver you're all stuck behind at the roundabout or junction, throwing your hands up I exasperation that I missed several pull out opportunities and saying I shouldn't be on the roads.
No doubt someone will be along to tell me how making excuses, am lazy, how if I just tried harder because everyone struggles at first yada yada yada - but none of that will change the fact that despite years of trying, thousands of £ and a lot of miser, I haven't reached the standard required. I have many other skills, if some people are so wedded to the idea that someone who can't drive is so useless as to be a non entity, then they're not someone I want around me.

OP I have three teens - all learnt to drive and I have given them some lessons. It’s is scary!!! They panic and get scared.
Weve also been round the car parks and they couldn’t get the clutch or break or anything in between. So I’m not surprised you thought it was a negative experience.

This is why we pay instructors! Bray much he’s had 15/20 lessons he should be good enough to drive with you in the car.

Meh, my parents didn’t drive either (would have been difficult for my mum as she was blind!!) 😀

My brother and I both learned to drive though, albeit in our mid 20s.

The reason I learned to drive? My DP drove and I didn’t and he found the burden of driving us everywhere too much, so I booked lessons straight away and got a license within 4 months.

Your DP clearly doesn’t understand that it’s important to you. Booking him lessons won’t help because he wont use them! Tell him again he NEEDS to get this sorted.

Attractiveness is subjective but personally I think that anyone- male or female - who is unable/unwilling to learn to transport themselves around and - crucially - relies on and/or expects others to ferry them around is not an attractive trait.

I passed on my 5th attempt and have had more recent pandemic-related issues of being nervous about driving, but as I live rurally I had to get over it.

I’m not judging others, just saying that personally I couldn’t imagine being in a relationship with someone who doesn’t drive; it’s quite Beta to be a helpless partner in terms of sharing the load and/or needing lifts and I wouldn’t run around after someone who is not helping themselves or willing to learn to do things themselves as long as they’re a NT adult.

Impoverished town, mammy and ties to the seaside? You must live in Teesside? 😅

YANBU though. I met DH when I was young and we lived in a city, so him not driving was never a deal breaker for me then but it certainly became a pain in the arse when we moved more rurally. Ultimately, he took a job that was difficult to get to on public transport and was forced to learn. It is exhausting being the family taxi.

Haha you guessed correctly!

Middlesbrough to be exact 😂 he grew up in Whitby, so they're practically middle class compared to us Boro lot

There is a balance here. I understand that for some people are afraid to drive- most of us think it is normal, but at the end of the day you are driving a tonne of metal at high speeds which can have fantastically awful consequences. For some people this is too much. However for a couple this can be hard work, particularly at holiday time when one is driving all the time and the other partner is a passenger. I think a responsible partner would look to get over their fear and help out. Overall does your DP pull their weight in other areas?

So, I have a driving license but am a nervous driver, so have to admit my husband does most of the driving - day trips, long drives, in laws, holidays etc. I feel bad and I am working on it - today I picked our daughter up from nursery and did the big shop. I'm gaining confidence with small trips. We live in a small semi-formal town with ok transport links and I can walk to many places, so I don't have to rely on him excessively, but still.

I learnt to drive on my mid 30s and it is hard (I lived in london before, so no need to drive really) - I think you're more aware of what can go wrong and how many maniacs there are on the road, so I understand his reluctance, but I also feel like you are having to do way more than your fair share, so I understand why you're frustrated. I agree with others - find a good instructor, maybe an intensive course - but automatic- it was a total game changer for me and has made driving so much easier and more enjoyable. And be kind - if he is nervous it's much harder to admit for a guy i think (see comments from previous posters!) And as fears go, it's one of the more rational ones. I think the other alternative is to move somewhere where driving is less necessary. Good luck.

I don’t blame him for not wanting to drive, not everyone enjoys it and some people find it downright nerve wracking. My brother fits into that category and he won’t learn, and my family are complete arseholes about it… even though it doesn’t impact on them at all!

having said that you need a car for so much these days, if you have a family and only one parent drives it does put a lot of the work on them. If I was the sole driver in my family I’d want my DH to take over one of my “jobs” to make it fair.

Im with you OP, I live in London and you dont even need to live rurally to have this be a problem.
Driving saves time, time, particularly when you have a young family is so precious. I have a friend with 3 kids whose husband doesnt drive, she does every nursery drop, every shopping trip, every extra curricular activity drop off. It's painful!

Oh my god you sound exactly like me so fear not you are not alone! My spatial awareness is terrible - when I did learn to drive I drove my then BF’s car into the wall instead of the drive because I couldn’t gauge the width of the drive (he was furious as it was a decent width). I would go into panics if I had to reverse to let the oncoming car through plus so many other situations that can crop up when you’re driving, my brain just can’t seem to process them even though I’m fine in day to day life. If I was given an automatic and could drive down a completely empty Route 66 for instance, I’d be fine. It’s all the other things that give me a meltdown. The day I sold my car I vowed to never drive again.

YANBU. I’m only just learning now (early 30s) but wish I had done it years ago. It’s a bit embarrassing if I’m honest.

Yes, exactly that!

Some people are very dismissive of non-drivers as they assume it’s simply due to laziness, when they’d be far more understanding if you told them you’d never learnt to read and write because you were severely dyslexic. 🤷🏻‍♀️

I suspect a lot of people who struggle to learn to drive might have dyspraxia but it’s not as widely accepted by the community as dyslexia now is.

I love the hypocrisy on Mumsnet. If this was other way around, and it was him saying this to you there would be an outcry 🙄

As I said above to a pp, if this behaviour was displayed by a man towards a woman, people would be going on about coercion and control.

I honestly don't know how some partners on here put up with it. If my DH displayed bullying behaviour trying to force me to do something I don't want to, he'd be ditched.

I said I’m embarrassed. Not I’m embarrassed for you.

I used public transport for years but it just isn’t workable at times - A&E runs, getting to village locations, needing to travel in the small hours of the morning. Taxis cost an absolute fortune and half the time you can’t get one on the spur of the moment. Uber doesn’t work outside of cities. Plus trains etc are hardly cheap these days.

@Frazzledmummy123

I don't think it's coercive control to book someone some driving lessons! Not unless it's part of a pattern of abuse, intimidation and control, which it doesn't seem to be here.

Well said.

It certainly doesn’t have to mean laziness, in fact it’s probably rarely that and more a deep-seated fear and anxiety so it’s quite unpleasant reading some of the judgey and horrible comments on here. I took many lessons over many years with many different driving instructors and passed on my sixth (or maybe even my seventh) go. I hated every minute of it and I certainly don’t consider that lazy. I just wasn’t cut out for driving in the same way most people aren’t cut out to be a commercial jet pilot.

No, I said if it was the other way around it would be called coercive control. On MN if a man tells a woman what to do it is called this.

Though if someone doesn't want to drive and their partner buys them lessons and sends a instructor to the door with view of 'kicking off' if they don't do it, then that is bullying and controlling behaviour.

Oh he's far from a lazy person! I do think it's mostly anxiety due to waiting till now to do it,rather than getting it out of the way when you're a fearless teenager/young person. For example, I'm not too keen on roller-coasters anymore and I used to absolutely love them. And the simple reason for that is the voice in the back of my head going "you fall off this roller-coaster = the kids are left without a mam" 😂😂