Advice ASAP Ds driving on motorway

[Carol52]

My son has been driving for just a year. Never driven on motorway and he and his friends driving 3 hours to Akron towers tomorrow. Girlfriend has driven on motorways but won’t drive now because of period and the fact they are setting off early. I am worried as he hasn’t been sleeping well lately because of university choices etc. last night he didn’t seem really happy about driving.
need advice . He seems a bit nervous understandably but I i don’t know what to advise him.advice asap please

Two things baffle me here.

Your DS has been driving for a year and never Driven on a full carriageway, let alone a motorway?!

His GF won’t drive because she’s on her period?!

Do you live in the 50s on both counts?

He’ll need to learn to drive on different roads one day. Not sure it’s useful having an alert passenger, he needs to keep on top of it himself. This is one of the issues (that often comes up on here) is the motorway is deemed as awfully scary when they’re actually really safe and you’re much more likely to die on other roads.

That's changed if in a proper dual control car apparently

The dysmenorrhea I had when I was young was debilitating at times - basically they were contractions but more continuous and the pain made me sick sometimes. I wouldn’t have wanted to go out for the day at all on the first day of it tbh. I can only assume the posters sniping at the girl haven’t ever had anything like that.

You are now apparently. If you're with an instructor in a dual control car. My son did it eith his.

So she doesn’t drive to work on her period ? How bizarre

Not really. If it was that bad, she wouldn't be going to Alton towers for the day would she?! She’s making excuses.

Depends how much pain someone is in ....period pain can be savage and I remember spending hours curled up in bed with it as a teenager.
Although in this scenario, if its that bad I don't think she would be able to cope with a day at Alton towers!
My main concern would be OP that you say he hasn't had alot of sleep....and motorway driving is hard if youre not confident about it....I still find it hard after 20 years of driving, with sliproads, lanes etc.
If they can't get public transport, I would personally be inclined to drive them or even book them a taxi.

But she is well enough to go to a theme park and go on rides - not be at home in bed resting ?!

Meant to add that they are trying to pass a law in this country that people under 21 or 25 cannot carry younger people of that age in the car. It’s called a Graduated Driving Licence GDL

passenger Restrictions:
A core component of GDL is to ban or limit young, newly qualified drivers from carrying passengers of a similar age for a set period after passing their test.

he could tell his SatNav to avoid motorways altogether and have a much more interesting but longer journey

Country lanes, where it's narrow with blind corners and people drive up to 60mph, are more dangerous than motorways. Motorways are quite safe and very straightforward (literally).

Op, your son will be fine. Your anxiety is feeding his, when you tell him to get a friend to watch for hazards. Just relax and occupy yourself with something to take your mind off it.

He will be fine. He just needs to do it. We live over an hour from a motorway and dh took dc on it the moment they passed their test to give experience. Ds18 now drives all over the place. He just needs to take it steady and keep his wits about him.

He’s been driving for a whole year, he will be just fine. My dd went on the M1 the day after she passed to get to school.

she’s probably hoping she feels ok when she gets there but knows her own body well enough to know she may not be safe to drive. If she doesn’t feel great when she gets there she doesn’t need to go on rides, if she’s hit with awful cramps when she’s driving it would be dangerous. Can people really not understand the difference?
I’m glad many of you have no idea how that might feel; I do.

So if he wasn't driving to Alton Towers he could potentially go another year without driving on a dual carriageway to motorway? Has everyone just assumed he will never leave where you live? All that work to learn to drive and pass the test and then you don’t bother using it to the full?

You are now if your with an approved instructor.

My Ds did motorway with his and I was surprised!

OP if he can drive on and off slip roads into moving traffic the motorway should be fine. Keep left, drive at the speed of the traffic and most importantly don’t get hey up in peer pressure if going faster.

Maybe the GF is just fed up of driving everywhere and us throwing him in at the deep end so he gets over his roadblock?

Which motorway is it, and when? Not all motorways are overcrowded terrifying experiences, especially outside of peak times. My advice would be to keep pace with the lorries until you get used to it, then start think about overtaking.

Anyway carping about the girlfriend or why the lad hasn’t driven on motorways at this point isn’t remotely helpful to the OP.

If the trip is tomorrow, then can you or someone else take him out today for some practise particularly on slip roads? DD wasn’t confident about motorway driving at first so DH took her out for some practice, made sure she understood how to adjust the wing mirrors correctly (and use them), understand where the ‘blind spots’ were. I think he found some good YouTube videos as well.

Clearly, going to a theme park and driving on a motorway are two different activities with different attention requirements. In one, you have no responsibility. In the other, you're responsible for the safety of your passengers and other road users.

You also don't know that she'll be going on the scarier rides. Maybe she'll be opting out of many of those, but still wants to go on the day trip to spend time with her friends.

Gosh everyone bitching about his GF not wanting to drive, why should she? Period aside, why is everyone considering her the default driver here just because OPDS hasn’t made any effort to build his driving experience in the whole year since he passed his test? I mean is might be fairer to take turns but acting as if she is in the wrong for not driving them all is ridiculous.

Yes, good for her. It's really not that odd and she's being responsible. I don't drive on the first day of my period. I often feel mildly dizzy and foggy and don't want to risk it. I have literally fainted once. I'd have felt it coming on, so been able to stop, but I don't feel comfortable driving until that first day has passed.

I think motorways are generally some of the safer roads to drive on as everyone is going the same way! But, if he hasn’t driven on dual carriageways much and has never been on a motorway, I think I would dissuade him until you (or preferably an instructor) can spend an hour with him advising him how to merge, how to change lanes, stopping distances, lane etiquette, exiting and all of those sorts of things. After all, he can’t have much of any experience of driving at 70mph or being surrounded by people driving at those speeds or faster - and then someone in the middle lane doing 69. In these weather conditions, I would be particularly reluctant to let him drive due to the amount of surface water and spray. He won’t have experienced overtaking a lorry throwing up a lot of spray but nor will he have experienced sitting behind one (and I don’t suppose he is going to want to go that slowly today so will end up overtaking).

Not necessarily. I don't drive on my first day due to slight dizziness, brain fog and wanting to be a responsible driver. However, I can go somewhere with someone else driving me. I might not be as active but can still go along for the ride.

Is this one of the situations where he might be grateful for you to play the bad guy and tell him he can't do it, they find alternative transport, then book him for a motorway lesson?

To be fair, if you live somewhere without a motorway nearby, as I did when I learnt to drive, it’s not that surprising! I had done dual carriageways though…