Hello everyone, my name is Kacie and I am 21 years old. I just joined this site today because my fear of driving has become extremely inconvenient over time. I used to live in New York and I moved to Florida around 4 years ago. In New York, driving was not really necessary but where I am now, everything is spaced out and you basically need a car to get from here to there. I tried learning how to drive the first year I moved down here. My boyfriend was teaching me and when I was in the drivers seat I just felt very nervous (which I thought was normal because I was just learning) and I sarted to become really sweaty and out of it..I was driving and he was yelling at me to take a turn and I was just so confused and I felt frozen and I eventually took the turn but I crashed. I am terrified of driving, I actually fear if I get behind the wheel I would be putting myself in danger or someone else on the road! Not to mention I am even a nervous passenger. I am completely tensed throughout the whole ride. I have tried driving again since that accident but it was on a straight abandoned road but I was still so nervous and scared. I just don't know how to overcome this fear and everyone always gets on my case about me not driving but they just dont understand what I am going through. Hopefully someone here can relate to me, I just need someone to talk to about this, it's only been getting worse and I don't know if I will ever get rid of this anxiety, I just don't want to be pressured to do this anymore!! HELP!
Just curious -- are there any particular reasons behind you feeling nervous in both the driver's seat and the passenger's seat? With the driver's seat, I totally understand, man... I was much like this when I first learned how to drive a few years ago.
Do you have fears of possibly getting into accidents and such? Or you're worried you'd piss off other drivers around you? etc.?
If you don't feel up to it then don't. It's dangerous, there are so many things competing for attention on the road if you are not in the right frame of mind you are like I said dangerous.
I'm not sure if this will help, but taking small steps has helped me in the past w/ certain things. I like driving, but years ago I actually couldn't go grocery shopping. To get used to it I started by buying just a few items, going to the express lane, and getting the heck out of there. Then I moved onto buying more items at a time, etc. Maybe going on short drives for exposure will help, even if it's just for a few minutes. And after you get used to that you can go on longer drives. Not sure if this'll help, but it's worth a try. Good luck, and hang in there.
I'll tell you this. Nobody is great at driving the first few times they get behind the wheel. That is especially true in my case and I've always been extremely fearful of hitting someone while driving car. While learning how to drive I amassed a grand total of 8 hours of driving, which was enough to pass my first road test somehow. I still didn't drive after that because I would still get anxious behind the wheel. I then moved to Alberta and got a job which involves some of our employees going out and driving around the city to drop off new computer equipment, move old stuff, etc (deployers). I was a desk worker though so only sometimes I'd get put with one of the deployers to help them out, never drove.
I walked into work on December 9, the day after a wicked snowstorm. My boss threw car keys at me and said "drive". Turns out one driver was on vacation, the other two with drivers licenses called in "sick". That day was probably the most stressful day of my life having to get into an unfamiliar car that was worth basically everything I make in a year, drive alone for the first time, drive in snow for the first time, and drive in Calgary for the first time. About halfway through the day I felt a lot less stressed and actually started focusing on trying to enjoy the fact that I was trusted with the vehicle. I realized that learning to drive without someone nagging me about every little thing was probably the best way for me to get comfortable with it. I've driven most work days since that and I feel kinda comfortable now. I've even managed to learn how to merge onto highways properly and not freak out at the fact that I'm going 100km/h+ with thousands of dollars of computer equipment in the back.
Now I'm not saying I'm not scared of hitting anyone anymore, because I definitely am. I just think that a huge thing people should try to do is to drive alone and get used to how the vehicle you're in moves, what it can and can't do, and to make mistakes without feeling like you're a complete idiot because the person in the passenger seat that would be yelling at you isn't there. You're going to make mistakes, it's inevitable. Just practice alone in an empty parking lot for an hour a few times and get comfortable with the vehicle. Then that way you can focus on what's going on with the people and cars around you instead of focusing on, for example, trying to brake smoothly for a red light. (That was my huge problem for the longest time)
In no way, shape, or form, am I a good teacher when it comes to this sort of stuff. I just hope that people with driving anxiety will get to overcome it and feel the freedom of driving a car. It's a great feeling to have that kind of freedom after relying on public transit and taxis all my life.
I actually hired a driving instructor because I couldn't learn from either my sister or father who teach by yelling a whole lot. I sometimes don't want to drive. I sometimes get worried but I really love the independence driving myself places I need to go.
I found my driving instructor liked use his brakes far more than he should have. It really fucked with being able to control what I was doing. He also kept complaining I wasn't doing hand over hand right, so I was so focused on that. I ended up over steering and under steering because he kept bugging me about it. I notice now I do it properly and I don't even have to think about it. The yelling is seriously detrimental to learning in my opinion.
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