Driving whilst pregnant

[jugglingwoman]

I'm rather short and we've just realised that if I get pregnant, I may have a problem driving. My stomach is already only a few inches from the steering wheel and if I put my seat back I wouldn't be able to reach the pedals. Silly problem, but could be quite major as DSS goes to a village school.

Has anybody else had this issue? What did you do? I was wondering if you can extend the pedals but my Dad was concerned it might be illegal.....

TIA

I am v. short (5 ft) and my shortness is in my legs (about 26 inches).

In my second pregnancy I would have struggled if I'd gone a week more I think ! I had to move the seat back as far as I could to touch the pedals and I could just squeeze behind the wheel. At the time my dh wasn't' driving due to ill health either so I did sort of need to drive.

Modern cars do have all sorts of tricks about them though - ours you can move the steering wheel, move the seat up and down as well as backwards and forwards. Also will depend on how you carry - with dd2 I was massively out the front hence the problems but if you carry small or all round it might not be an issue.

My mum used to drive with blocks on her pedals when pregnant with my brother but not sure that would be legal now

I'mm sure I've heard about short people having blocks fixed on to the pedals to make them easier to reach.

Try contacting one of the agencies that deals with mobility issues (argh, can't remember what they're called, the ones who modify cars for drivers with mobility SNs).

But have you checked first whether you can change the position of the seat and the steering wheel? I get huuuuuuge in pregnancy, and would have had difficulty working the pedals even though I am tall, but found that by raising the seat height and changing the angle of the steering wheel I was able to continue driving without difficulty. Drove my dh nuts though, when he had to use the car!

Both cars we have you can move the seat up and down and the steering column. But still, I'm not left more than probably 5 inches. I do use a back support so I guess that will give me a few more inches.

It's got the point that this morning my DH has emailed me train times from all local places to the train station nearest DSS's school. It would take 30 mins on the train, a walk/taxi/lift from DH from the house end to the station and then a 30 min walk at the other end. We may end up choosing which house to buy by how close it is to a station.....

My sister carried in front the first time and not so bad with her second. Just makes me nervous but then I think I'm just nervous about everything at the moment so it's probably not as big an issue as it seems!

Have you got a 'bump belt' as well? Helps keep the horizontal bit of the belt below the bump.