Very nervous car driver

buscape

Do a Pass Plus course. Might make your insurance a bit cheaper as well.

thegirlintheattic

Get some lessons with a driving instruction before you go back on the roads.

arcon5

Agreed with others... phone your driving instructor and take some more lessons. It will cost you about £20 per lesson, but still cheaper than the excess you will pay if you crash and better than costing you or some poor soul their life if you make a critical mistake.

There is absolutely no shame in requiring additional tuition!

cyclonebri1

tanith wrote: »

I'm actually amazed that you passed your test if you really are this nervous. I'd take a whole course of lessons until you are comfortable driving along the road and not worrying about every small manouvre..good luck

Bet that's helped:A:A:A, some folks simply want to criticise, I give up on this thread

s1lv3rdal5

Try taking more Driving Lessons, I believe there are special ones for nervous drivers.
At the moment it really sounds as if you are Not Safe on the roads.
Have you thought about Public Transport or Taxi's

AlexisV

Just sounds like you were in an unfamiliar environment. After half and hour you probably would have relaxed.

You just need practice. Just find some quite housing estate and tootle round in your usual car for a few evenings.

Joe_Horner

Positive bit first:

You obviously reached the "required standard" to drive because you have a licence. They don't give "sympathy passes" so please stop lessening that achievement in your own head! Having reached that standard, finding the confidence to continue driving and learning is the important bit. In a way, your lack of confidence can be a positive - at least you're not out in your Corsa, with a new licence and no real experience, doing 60 through 30 limits cuz u no it all, innit

Now the tough bit - how to maybe gain that confidence.

There are only two ways to gain confidence behind the wheel. One is to have it naturally from the start (which often means it's misplaced and your Corsa ends in a tree) and the other is practice / experience.

Depending where you are, one of the best ways to gain experience is to get out on nice, long, rural drives on quiet A roads. That's not usually practical with an instructor because of cost etc but it works just as well with your OH (or anyone else for that matter) beside you provided they're a calm and patient passenger. Or can at least do a good impression of one!

It's also important for you to trust the driving of whoever sits with you so that, if they do need to comment or advise at times, you'll find the advice easier to accept.

Presumably you know your area, so try to work out a few nice "day out" drives - preferably an hour or more of actual driving in each direction - which you can go on at times when traffic's likely to be ok. As an example, around here, the A5 through Snowdonia is great for this sort of thing if you avoid bank holidays / holiday changeover days and so on.

You can head off for a couple of hours and end up and any number of cafes, truck stops, attractions / picnic spots and so on so it's a proper day out. The fuel and cafe cost will be much less than lessons! Get used to taking the lead in everything from planning where you're going, checking the route, likely traffic, weather etc so that you're in control of things from the start.

It gives you a chance to get used to simply driving, without having to worry too much about other cars, and by making it a day out, you're not "just practicing" - you're driving for a reason. In other words, you're "doing it for real now".

You'll find that sort of driving very quickly helps you become confident with handling the car itself, to the point it'll become almost second nature.

Once using the controls becomes instinctive, then you can start worrying about places where you might have to judge clearance to parked cars and so on. Only, if you instinctively know what your car's doing, you'll find you don't "worry" about it at all

worried_jim

Lum wrote: »

Unless you live near a church, in which case expect the roads to be full of badly parked cars on both sides and for people to pull out in front of you without looking.

You must live near me! Every Sunday morning I see parishioners testing the power of prayer (and my brakes).

sharpy2010

If driving upsets you as much as you say, and you are as nervous as you say, I think I'd be tempted to give it up as a bad job and get public transport from now on.

Driving is not a pleasant experience these days, due to idiots on the road, sheer weight of cars, not being able to find a space to park in, always having to drive 'defensively', etc etc.

If I were starting to learn to drive today, and not 20 years ago like I actually did, I genuinely don't think I'd bother.

joedenise

sharpy2010 wrote: »

If I were starting to learn to drive today, and not 20 years ago like I actually did, I genuinely don't think I'd bother.

Some of us don't really have a choice. Where I live the buses don't run very frequently and take so long to get anywhere because they go round all the villages to get to the nearest town! You have to be more patient to use the buses than to drive a car, which I'm not these days.

Denise