In 2020 I was looking for a place that was warm to spend the winter. I thought of Florida but every place I’ve been there was highly dependent on Highway driving. Even to just get to the grocery (Ft lauderdale I’m looking at you). And then someone mentioned that she liked to go to Palm Desert in CA “because it’s so easy to drive there”. I booked a house immediately and we’ve gone every winter ever since. I am not a comfortable highway driver and my friend was right….driving there is easy and requires no real Highway driving.
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I’m sorry your H is so resistant. I just worry if he causes permanent injury or death to him, yourself, or others, it will really be a huge issue. Could you frame it as trying to help people who need work and you guys are being generous by helping pay them a bit to let them drive you? It is very delicate but 3 wrecks is 3 too many, especially if one is giving you recurring nightmares. One of the posters on this CC had her life and that of her parents permanently worsened because her parent was hit by an elderly impaired driver. The parent went from perfectly fine to having major health issues.
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I worry as well, but realistically there’s a limit to what I can do. Fortunately, he no longer needs to make a long drive on an interstate highway every week as he once did. His last trip was in November and there are none on the horizon, partly because I canceled a trip scheduled for next month. I’ve already decided to fly if we make the trip that’s scheduled for late spring, and deal with the medical issues as best I can. I appreciate your concern, but there’s not anything else I can say or do about this.
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My husband and I thought that self driving cars would come along before we got old enough to need them. That no longer seems likely. But it is helpful that there are backup cameras and safety improvements. (I never drove enough to use cruise control much, but on the new car I’ll try to get used to adaptive cruise control.) Plus Uber/Lyft options we never envisioned.
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As someone who evaluated people with cognitive issues, I have to disagree that there is “nothing you can do”. He is not only a potential danger to himself, he is a potential danger to others. You can ask his primary care physician to refer him for a formal driving evaluation. Depending on where you live they may be done in different facilities. There are driving rehab specialists. Separate from a vision eval (that should always be done) there are evals that can look at spatial skills, reaction time, planning/problem solving, memory, etc, all skills necessary for safe driving.
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My DH loves his adaptive cruise control. I don’t use mine b/c I like driving my car, and I found that (well depending on the setting), if the car slowed down too soon in traffic with cars in front of me, other cars would cut in! I also didn’t like some of the enhanced autopilot features I had. It would change lanes when I might not have, and n having it take itself off the highway to the exit was just scary! I stopped using it so am not sure if it still does that.
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I turn off lane assist for similar reasons. Feeling that slight movement in the steering wheel creeps me out. I don’t trust the backup camera either. I’ll use my own faculties, thank you.
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We borrowed a friend’s Tesla model Y for a week and were amazed at its self-driving and self-navigating capabilities.
Can you take one for a test drive, or rent one from Hertz (they have a lot of them I think) to see if that would help either of you?
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I agree with @jym626 . What if your husband kills a child the next time he totals a car? You know he has an issue, wouldn’t you feel guilty and wish you had said/done something? I know I would.
You don’t have to frame it as “I think you have a problem”, more like “totalling this many cars is an outlier, why not get evaluated to see if there’s a change that could help”. Or something along those lines.
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Plus 1 to all of that. The wife of one of my friends is an alcoholic who refuses to get help (both are retired, in their 60s.) She drives under the influence not infrequently…and every time she does, she is putting all of their [substantial] assets at risk, in addition to the potential horror of hurting innocent people. So far he’s not done anything (beyond encouraging her to get help), is considering putting breathalyzers on the cars.
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Maybe I’m being too empathetic here and while no one is wrong and I think we’ve made good points to @Silpat to consider….
But maybe we move away from hammering the issue for her. I think she sweats this enough on her own already.
Unless she wants more suggestions!
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Backup cameras can be really helpful, especially in car designs where it is hard to see back in the rear view mirror. It’s a complaint I hear a lot. (I have noticed that visibility is improved though in my ancient minivan for past few years with rear seat down and captain’s seats removed. Still if I had known we’d keep the vehicle for 19 years I would have added a camera.)
When I drive my husband’s newer car, I do appreciate the blind spot monitors on the side mirrors. I don’t drive it enough to totally trust it… still turn my head before switching lanes. BUT it does save repeatedly turning my head in when the indicator light is on.
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I agree with you… to a point. I am not an attorney so I don’t know if the fact that she knows he has had several accidents but feels there is nothing that can be done, could this be considered a “known risk” that might make her have some level of culpability should he hit and injure/kill someone? Not meaning to browbeat, and understand the transportation options sound limited in her area, but totaling 3 cars is a red flag that warrants attention. And if it were me, I wouldn’t allow him to drive the granddaughters. Anywhere. if he’s so sure he’s OK to drive. He should have nothing to worry about if he has it evaluation.
When we started to have some concerns about my late dad’s driving, we had him evaluated. They said he could drive “locally”. Umm… what’s the definition of “locally” in the counties surrounding NYC?
Quick side story related to topic- when my parents retired they became docents at the Bronx zoo. My dad continued after my mom passed away. He knew every shortcut there was to get to every part of the Bronx (he grew up there), and “old, learned information” can be intact when the individual demonstrates trouble learning new information or making good decisions. Sooo, one day the weather was terrible, but apparently he felt it was his responsibility to get to the zoo to do his shift. I called him later that day and asked how he was doing that day and if the caregiver was able to get there in the inclement snowy, weather. He proudly announced that he had made it all the way to the zoo, but the zoo was closed due to the weather!! DUH! I had to keep from yelling at him over the phone “what where you doing driving in those conditions?!?!?!” Apparently it didn’t occur to him to call the zoo! So, his ability to drive the car and to remember how to get there were intact in that scenario, but the decision to drive there and not call ahead were bad choices!
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Agreed, but if one could, renting for a while to get a sense of the community and making connections would be really valuable as a transition.
ShawWife has already done that in the community where her mother has a house. But, the place is really changing as a result of the hurricanes. Lots of people want to sell so the market is not good. Instead they are fixing up and renting. So, a portion of the community may become transient.
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Unless you are retired you need a lot of flexibility to be in a rental place for more than a week or two. It’s just not possible for many people to by away from work that long and many jobs can not be done remotely.
We knew where we would likely move to after retirement but it wasn’t possible for us to rent before we retired. I spent most of my PTO traveling back to spend time with ailing/aging parents. My husband’s system engineering job could not be done remotely.
We did take short visits to the area but not enough time to create community or make connections with people.
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The flight to Japan itself is also a very long time in a seat, even coming from the west coast; that could be difficult to manage.
Another thing to be aware of is that Japan is very much not accessible to the degree the US is; there is a lot of going up and down stairs, and typically there just aren’t places to sit down in public areas, which can really take visitors by surprise!
(Many people who travel regularly are used to taking breaks to sit for just 5 minutes in a park, museum, or on a bench—but this is not the way it is in Japan, and tourists tend to feel fatigued much faster than they normally might without those mini-breaks.)
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Whenever I travel, I always bring my lightweight telescopic walking sticks and a folding camp stool, both of which fit neatly into my backpack. While I can walk all day without issue, standing still for extended periods—such as in museums—can be challenging for me. Additionally, in Japan, trash cans are scarce, and it’s customary for people to carry their own trash until they can properly dispose of it.
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You may have been referring to my situation. Yes, my dad was hit by an elderly driver in a parking lot (not highway, not running a red light).
I reported her to our state, in PA there is a form you can fill out. I imagine most states are the same.
The question I always ask friends is, “would you let your toddler (or toddler grandchild) ride with this person?” If the answer is No, then IMHO they should not be on the road.
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I know this is not the situation re: spouse driving Silpat is facing …just sharing that my mom (in her mid-80s) had very hard time with the idea of my dad stopping driving (he was the family driver for their 50 years of marriage). She kept trying to help him ‘get back to it’ after he would be released from the hospital or rehab (he had heart issues, mobility issues, vascular dementia and at least one near miss with the car).
I finally said - you have lived a life of such service and care for others - do you really want one of your last acts on this earth to contribute to a family dying in a car crash?
It was pretty dramatic and I’m not sure it made an immediate difference. I just didn’t want a tragedy to define the last years of their lives (not to mention the potential harm to others).
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A senior driver almost gave me a heart attack yesterday - we have an artery in our neighborhood that feeds onto a more major road, but that road (as well as the other) is on a fairly big slope. Since it was all county road/not very populated area from years ago but now is more populated, one has to get to the stop sign and then edge forward to see beyond a big tree on the left. I was on the main road turning left (so coming down some slope); the errant driver had gone up fast to beyond the stop sign and came within inches of hitting me as I was turning left. When I started the turn she was not anywhere near the intersection. I literally stopped in my turn (she was about to hit me just behind my driver door). She had on wide sunglasses, and she didn’t even turn her head! She allowed her car to roll down the hill a little and turned her car to the right (she was also positioned beyond her lane in addition to being into the entering road lane). As soon as she started rolling back, I was able to get away. It was awful.
That really shook me up. I tend to drive ‘off hours’ to avoid busy traffic times, and do drive defensively.
Sometimes in shopping parking lots, I get a cart before I get to the store – it is safer for me to get protection from a shopping cart with some of these drivers that race through parking lots. We have a friend that got hit in a shopping parking lot but he was hit by a younger person (and they did stop).
Y’all be safe!
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