If you don’t drive your world is much smaller

[Imreallyokayipromise]

I have a friend who doesn’t drive, for many reasons (anxiety, dyslexia) she also doesn’t use public transport so her world seems very small to me. She has a small child who doesn’t leave the house unless they are going to nursery school. Her partner drives but never seems to want to go anywhere either and she has to make all her plans around him and get permission and everytime we discuss it I just feel like she has no independence and her world is so small. It really got me thinking that if you can drive so many possibilities open up and your world becomes much bigger. Even if it’s just doing your own food shop or visiting a friend.

Sounds more like she's a prisoner to her child's father.

What do you really think the chances are that she has control over money, is allowed to go out and use public transport or that she would be permitted (and childcare provided) to book, pay for and take driving lessons/pass a test/buy and insure a car?

He's made her world into four walls with the occasional bit of day release when taking the kid to and from nursery (and I bet she's expected straight back indoors as soon as the classroom door closes).

Smaller yes but not necessarily a problem. If she is ok about it its no issue.
Edit - ignore me, Ive just spotted that her husband is controlling, that is clearly an issue. But the smaller world bit...... isnt necessarily a problem.

I have a friend who has passed her driving test but won't drive. She lives in a fairly remote place with a bus to the nearest town and railway station every hour but it stops at 6pm. If her husband can't (or won't) give her a lift she expects me or another friend to pick her up and take her home and it's really out of our way. She doesn't work as she never went back after her children went to school so she does housework and watches TV. I think she has a very small world.

I have an anxiety disorder that affects my ability to travel quite severely. Its far from ideal obviously and I have therapy for it

I'm not sure what your point is? What do you get out of being unreasonable or not unreasonable here? Are you planning to help her? Because it seems like you just want to be right that she's "wrong" in some way?

Sorry my friend was just an example, the thread was about having more independence and opportunities if you are able to drive etc

I have a really small world atm. And? I'm not sure what people gain from looking down their snoots at someone's mental health struggles?

But its nature, yes it gives you less freedom and probably certain things would be easier if you drove.
However I don't drive. If you don't drive you just find other ways to get places. It's never been a barrier to seeing friends. I get food delivered. If you don't drive yes it takes you longer to get places sometimes but it's no big deal. My life is not like you describe in this thread so I don't really recognise what you're saying. If I had a car it would be a lot more expensive than now. So I'd have less money to do fun things. And people who drive generally walk less and just take a car where they could walk. And frankly, I don't really miss what I've never had.

DS can drive but lives in a large city centre and doesn't have a car but my world is smaller than his because I live in an East Midlands town with not much on and have to drive miles for concerts, airports, etc. Everything he wants is on his doorstep or a short taxi drive away and plentiful public transport.

I drive but I think my world is small. I don’t see many people and only go out to shop. We go out together as a family at the weekend. I’d say for me it’s cptsd thing. So not sure driving is the problem, but I guess it’s part of the bigger problem.

Well, jolly good for them.

And I've taken my child loads of places since she was a baby on the train or bus. Regularly. Not driving has not stopped us at all.

Sometimes I do think people who drive think they wouldn't be bothered doing that, just because they're used to driving.

This. It’s the anxiety.

I don’t drive but I love travelling on trains and tubes. If I need a lift I order a taxi. I like to zone out and be taken places. I used to suffer from anxiety and wouldn’t have been able to do any of this. Driving would have been even harder.

The only time I resent not driving is when we go to the vet so I have to get a taxi. Cos it's such a short journey! But that is not enough to make me learn to drive obviously

But your friend is a very extreme example.

Most non drivers use public transport to avoid being dependent on someone who doesn't want to ferry them around (family time of a weekend is a different thing if her husband is refusing to facilitate any of that). Which changes the size of their world drastically.

Many drivers have small worlds because although they can take themselves anywhere they...don't.

What did you want out of it?

It takes less time for me to walk to the retail park a mile away than go in the car zigzagging the potholes and trying to park. I walked there earlier and left the car at home.

Surely it depends where you live.
On the wirral, with trains and buses everywhere, you can do the beach or countryside or 2 cities.
Where I live, in what, on paper, is a big urban area, public transport is a joke. 2 buses per hour to the nearest decent shops-:45 min journey + 20 minute walk to a bus stop. I can drive it in 20.
Trains only really go to two places effectively: Chester or Rhyl. And one per hour.
Not driving would dramatically shrink my world.

Not in London - public transport is MUCH easier than driving anywhere. I lived in London for years and never drove - have moved to the suburbs and am taking my driving test imminently

I dont drive and its a regret. Saying I am the most active person i know and bring my 8 year old out constantly. We live in Dublin and regularly go to different cities, yes it takes longer but theres a big difference in living in a city and having access to public transport and a desire to get out than having anxiety and unwilling to take public transport.

You have more independence and opportunities if you're not in a coercive or controlling relationship.

This may include having access to a vehicle, but it doesn't need to.

In cities, it's not too bad. Less so further out. I don't drive and husband only passed his test a couple of years ago so we lived without a car for a long time and it was really limiting. It's still a bit restrictive now, particularly if I go anywhere in the evening as once my daughter is in bed he can't leave her to pick me up. I do intend to learn eventually but there's quite a few barriers to it which have deterred me thus far.

It sounds like your friend has multiple issues (including access to money, potentially) that are making her world smaller.

In general, whether not driving is limiting really does depend where you live. I don't drive, but have always lived in a city, so it's never really been an issue. Public transport isn't perfect, but does provide lots of options. If there's somewhere I really want to go but isn't close to a station, I factor in the cost of a taxi to/from the station. (Again, outside of London, that usually requires advance planning and booking, but it's not too much of a hassle.)

Almost all our holidays are to countries which also have excellent public transport so, again, it's not an issue. For places where it would be an issue, you can usually book a driver or go on some sort of tour. These are added expenses, obviously, but so is hiring a car and paying for insurance etc; plus I don't have to worry about finding parking, following directions etc. DS and I can just sit on a train, watching the world go by, chatting and building lego.

The not using public transport thing is def odd

I know a few who don’t drive and their lives are definitely restricted but they manage

we’d manage without but getting kids to extra curricular activities would be tricky. For some of them the only option would be to get a lift with someone else. Literally no viable public transport to get there form where we live. Or if there is it’s very sporadic. This is the suburbs of a major city.

I live a 5-minute walk from my office, a 10-minute walk from a shopping centre, 10 minutes on the underground train from the city centre, 30 minutes on the train from a large airport, and 2 hours away on the train from two of the biggest airports in Europe. So no, I don't need a car.

YANBU. I can’t drive (learning but not a natural and it’s taking me a while. Complex reasons why I couldn’t do it earlier, I’m 34) and not driving really does shrink your world.

Public transport is often late, or doesn’t turn up, or doesn’t go the exact route you need. A lot of places are off limits. Taxis cost a fortune and have to be booked well in advance. I absolutely hate it

YANBU here .Driving is an important skill ,and makes journeys more pleasant and achievable .Your friend though is trapped in an unhappy marriage with a controlling partner!