Did your Mum ever drive?

My Mum, born in 1940, drove, but was involved in an accident (as a passenger) when she was in her 60s. She lost confidence and never drove after that. My Fatger was happy enough to take her wherever she wanted to go, so it wasn’t an issue. Dad drove until he was about 84 and then decided to hang up his keys. Both gone now sadly…

My dad passed his test on the first attempt when he was seventeen in the late fifties. His father drove but his mother never did. My mother learned after we three children were born and passed at her first attempt in her early thirties in the early seventies. Her mother learned to drive in the sixties when she was in her forties and her father had had a car in the thirties before compulsory driving tests. He had twenty minutes of instruction and then drove away in his car. It showed, particularly towards the end of his life, where he would do such things as straddle two lanes at a junction to see which one moved first. He was always keen to advise other people on their driving, though... Strangely enough, when we went out as a family, my father always drove. Looking back, though, seven people in an Austin Maxi was interesting. My dad was the driver, my mum and grandma would sit in the back seat with my younger brother and sister and my sister sat on the arm rest. Grandpa would sit in the passenger seat and l would sit on his lap or between his legs, which was no mean feat as Grandpa was as round as he was tall. No health and safety in the seventies but lots of happy memories.

My husband’s grandfather learnt to drive pre-war so he never passed a driving test. He drove until he was in his nineties, but he was a terrible driver.

My mum started to drive in her early fifties and was very confident behind the wheel - until she had an accident in her late sixties and knocked a motorcyclist off his bike. She was not in any way to blame (he was way above the speed limit) and the chap recovered, but when she saw him being stretchered into the ambulance my mum decided that she would never feel confident again. The police helped her to arrange for the car to be removed by a tow truck when they’d finished at the scenes and my mum has never driven since.

My Mum didn’t drive although Dad did give her a few lessons. She always said that we were able to have nice things because she never had her own car.

My Dad learned to drive a truck during WW2, but never had the money to buy a car. Mum couldn’t even ride a bike.
We were married for quite a few years before we could afford a car, but DH did all the driving. He had also learned to drive while doing his National Service. I finally learned, and passed the test first time, when I was almost 50. Our 5 DC all passed their tests in their teens, and saved up for their own cars.
GD and GS were both bought cars by my DD when they passed their tests at 18, though they pay all the subsequent expenses themselves.
How times change!

I've never driven and I am 54. I would like all my 5 Grandchildren to learn young though, as I think my own view now is, there are so many twerps on the road and I don't want to be one of them ! Besides I love the scenery watching on a train and bus and I'm assuming doing that in a car wouldn't end positively.

My mum still drives her very racy wee Renault Twingo that is white with red stripes she is 89, she learned to drive 70 years ago in Africa in an old land rover on unmade roads. I don't think that she ever sat a driving test. Now she limits her outings to church and the village.

My mother learned to drive in her late 30s, when DF was posted to a small army base in an even smaller Yorkshire village with a very, very limited bus service. She was always accustomed to her independence and if driving was what was needed to retain it, drive she did.

I was slow to learn through lack of opportunity and also I saw my landlady killed when she was walking her dog late at night in a black coat on a narrow badly lit road. I was a witness at the trial of the driver and actually felt sorry for him. He hadn't been drinking and he was driving comfortably within the speed limit, my landlady just suddenly appeared from between two parked cars. He was acquitted. But it scared me because I could see that you could be driving and obeying all the rules and yet still end up killing someone.

I finally learned in my early 30s, after a house move to a large village and having two children to cart around everywhere.

I have driven ever since. I am now in my late 70s and I drive the 200 miles to visit DS and family without a problem and I drive in France when we are there.

When my father died when I was 17 neither my mother nor myself could drive the car so she sold it and we both started to learn. We both eventually passed and she drove for quite a few years. Friends to evening classes etc. She lent me the car for holidays.
Happy days.

My DDiL has passed her test but is too nervous to drive, which in this day and age I think very unfair on DS. He has to do a lot of driving through work and all the driving (200 miles) when they visit us. Not to mention holidays.

It worries me that DS may drive tired, because she is too unpracticed to take over if he is tired or ill. We offered to pay for her to have special coaching aimed at women in her position with this fear of driving, but nothing came of it. We have a lovely DDiL we love her to bits, but it does worry me that all the driving devolves on DS, when it shouldn't.

M0nica I’m sure dil pulls her weight in the family, most women do more housework/emotional labour (definitely do in my household). If she has a phobia perhaps it is safer if she doesn’t drive? Phobias are very difficult to overcome, (I speak with experience with one of my own I’ve tried and failed many times to overcome). It sounds like the bulk of his driving are for his job and visiting his parents anyway, rather than ferrying her about. Personally I find nervous drivers as much as a danger on the roads as speeding drivers. Especially around round abouts.

My mother didn’t, my father, a salesman, was out driving in the firm’s van all his working life and there was not enough money for a private family car. As he hated going anywhere as on the road every day, it wouldn’t have been used and we lived inner city with good transport.
I remember the spinster schoolmistress/general store owner in the remote hamlet in Oxfordshire where I stayed for long holidays urging the need for driving on to me as a child.
My MIL considered herself a ‘natural’ driver, and was truly terrifying to be with on the roads. After many near misses, she always started whistling as if to deflect the trouble, often remarking “Isn’t it good to be alive?”…
When I see elderly couples and the man driving, I sometimes wonder if he always drives and what a pity if so as life will be harder for the wife if she is widowed.
My very close male friend doesn’t drive (a touch of the absent minded professor) and I must say I resent doing all the driving when we go on trips. His too late in life lessons didn’t work out.
I have never enjoyed driving but it has been an absolute necessity. Strangely as someone upthread mentioned, I like driving on motorways.

Neither of my parents learned to drive there was no point they could never have afforded a car. Me and my 4 siblings never felt that we missed out with this situation most of our friends neighbours and extended family had cars either. It was exciting when one turned up in the area. It seems so strange now. We all managed though. Climate change issues make me wonder wether the old days were better. Most family's now have at least 2 cars and with teenage children added into the mix, often more, the terraced street were I live is a nightmare for parking or deliveries.

I do remember my mother learning to drive, I think my father was her main instructor and when learning she was the main family driver.

Someone asked me, then aged about 7, who I preferred driving, Mummy or Daddy? 'Mummy', I replied firmly, 'it is much more exciting.'

My mother born in 1918 lived in a Cornish village and used to go outside if they heard a plane or car as it was so unusual.

She never learned to drive. Dad was her chauffeur. Pity as he died relatively young at 67 and she had many years when she could have usefully driven herself, although she managed as best she could on public transport

My Mum passed her test first time when she was 46.

Dad didn't drive (though he did during the war apparently). Mum passed her test in her early 40s (when they could afford to buy a car?)