Learning to drive: easy or hard?

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im learning but it is so hard to communicate with my instructor. He uses rhetorical questions as prompts then accused me of "not wanting to learn" when i said "i dont know dont ask me" as i was so confused. i think we're over it for now until the next problem occurs.

I suffer from extreme sensory overload when I am behind the wheel of a car. I took adult drivers ed...the instructor started out confident and boastful about her ability to teach ANYone how to drive...and by the end of the class, she was quite infuriated with me. Other people have tried to teach me how to drive too. I failed the drivers test 3 times..for really stupid reasons...and I eventually sorta gave up..So I am 34 without a drivers license.

i also get severe sensory overload, it is hurting my ears just to reply to this message!
He wont let me wear earplugs in the car despite the fact i can hear perfectly well through them.

Colorimeter specs helped with light and sound sensitivity, aspartame avoidance also helped. GABA supplements helped me to be calm and i took one during a lesson when i had a near miss.

Have you managed to get a weighted blanket? i know they are expensive but ive heard they are worth the expense.

Alexis

I use buckwheat pillows for the weight. I turned my ASish friend on to them...by repeatedly plying him with them....and now he is stuck on them too...not much to do with driving...
I have taken GABA in the past, but fell out of the regimen...I also take l-theanine and Omegas..or try to...
For the light thing...I wear lots of brimmed hats and large sunglasses...I almost always have to have something on my head..especially outside my house...my sound sensitivity has dulled considerably...cause I run a venue...But I do wear e-mails and headphones lots...

The thing that causes me to be the most overwhelmed is having all these large moving objects all around me that I have no control over...also, I seem to have very bad depth perception. I am terrified just riding in a car...esp. on the freeway...My non-driving AS-ish mom is the same way.

I had a near miss during my first driving test...something to do with my literal interpretation of "Right on Red"

Learning to drive was easy. Learning to shift gears in the car I was given was next to impossible. This car had a lot of mechanical issues and it made it much more difficult to shift into gear and this caused me a lot of frustration. Other than that, learning was easy.

Learn in an automatic car problem solved with the gears issue. i also have to learn in an automatic car.

Oh, I have no intention on teaching her myself. I would be a nervous wreck and make her nervous too. I remember having my mother try ONE time and that was enough for me! No, I'm going to hire some brave soul to do it. Thanks for your replies. As I suspected there is a pretty good mix, perhaps with a bit of a skew toward more nervous! I'm sure she'll be fine, and all my worry will be for nothing.

I am interested in buying a weighted blanket for my also aspie son. But the one I saw was 250 bucks. Eeeek!

He'll probably be a great driver. He's obsessed with cars and machinery. And he ALWAYS knows where we are, as long as he's been there once before.

Anyway.

Ann

I wasn't allowed to get my license when I was 16. The whole me being a juvenile deliquent thing. At 18 I was a adult and responsible for my own actions so that's when I got it. I found the official classes and test very easy. Then again, I already had a couple hundred hours of practice behind the wheel of hot cars. (Can I say that on this forum??)

Learning to drive was actually not that hard for me. Parallel parking was a b*tch but I learned it.

Although I've been in a wreck before where I was naive about the yield turn signal. Driving is easy to me. I just lean my seat back with one hand on the stearing wheel and enjoy the music.

I found driving easy. It's not a hard skill to master, and I find there is much to getting trained on a course where mistakes can't hurt (no other traffic) and having a knowledgeable and patient instructor goes a long way. Once you know how to properly handle a car, you can handle the streets with more confidence.

Over the long term, your confidence with driving grows as you gain experience.

Please get a new instructor if he makes you feel that way again. Not wanting to learn? No you must injoy wasting £20 on a nice drive with an angry man. Remember it's your choice and you shouldn't feel you need to keep at it with someone who treats you like that.

It may help to explain you have a mild learning problem so he'll sometimes need to repeat things more than usual, don't need to tell them everything.

He already knows im autistic and disabled but takes people "at face value". Hes really a very passive person until there is a problem then he tells me to pull over at the side of the road and explains the problem. He teaches disabled people and has had experience of working with autistics but im guessing not ones that know how to stick up for themselves.

i used to respond to the questions "are you slowing down" with "i am slowing down", now i just reply "i am now". ive lost my autism alert card recently and need to get it replaced.

Alexis

Maybe you could try explaining that you're having problems to him, or get someone to do it for you? Ultimately, if it's not working, you should look for a new driving instructor.

Anyway, I'm extremely clumsy and unco-ordinated - I'll bang myself on doors, trip over my own feet, catch myself on things etc - and get easily distracted, but I found learning to drive quite easy, though at the time I didn't know I had any form of autism. I think I was probably a bit slower than your average person because of my nerves - I suffer from agorophobia- so my driving instructor took his time teaching me all the manoeuvres, despite me champing at the bit to get on with it, man! But I love driving. I love being in control of a car, and so on. I've never really had an issue with my co-ordination when it comes to driving. I picked up on clutch-control pretty easily, except for the occasional 'off' days where everything went to pot if I had to be totally honest.

I think you're just going to have to take a chance and see how it is. And sense of direction? There's always Sat-Nav!

I found learning to drive easy, as well as driving without the instructor. The trick is to stay relaxed and have some confidence in other drivers; a cautious driver is just as dangerous as a reckless driver.

I was told "you have excellent car control" today, my instructor was trying to teach me the theory of it for sometime.
It was an amazing revelation and i added "I wish to learn all the roads so I can predict what the speed limit is likely to be, then I can estimate if I'm going from a 40mph to a 50mph (for example) at cross roads. I'm sure it will really help me as due to knowing part of the route I was able to relax and think better".

i am now feeling more confident with my driving, i can use my aspergers to my advantage in a sense, now all i have to do is start learning those test routes.

Alexis