Spoke to my 87-year-old mother on the phone last night and she told me about an "incident" she had while driving last week. She was apparently going downtown to get her hair done and pulled up to park in front of the beauty shop. She thought she was hitting the brake, but must have hit the accelerator instead and went up-and-over the curb and ran into the wall of the shop! Then she dropped it into reverse to get off the sidewalk and must have hit the gas again and went all the way across the street and banged into a parked car!

Both me and my sisters have told her it is time to stop driving -- this is the third accident she has had in the past couple of years and on the two previous ones she totaled the cars that were involved. I am praying to God that the State of Minnesota takes away her license with this last event, since I could easily see my mom trying to hop back into the car despite the family's pleas to bring her driving days to an end.

Not a good scene -- she's lucky she hasn't killed anyone up to this point.....

 

For most drivers giving up your license to drive is giving up your freedom.

I have been through this a few times now.

My grandfather had several accidents over his final years behind the wheel but his last one he fell asleep driving home and hit two parked cars. Totaled them both and his own. My grandmother had to tell him he would be moving out if he bought another car.

My other grandmother was a menace behind the wheel. She is almost completely blind in one eye and doesn't see well with the other, add this to her being deaf and you can imagine the carnage. She too fell asleep while driving on the highway and hit the ditch. Could have died. She kept driving. When her doctor refused to sign off on her license renewal she found one that would. She finally stopped driving when she went back to England for two years. She came back two years ago and is 90 now with dementia and still complains about not having a car.

I don't know how it works where you are at but I blame the system. I think at 75 you should be road tested every two years as well as the physical. We have way too many seniors driving that have no right to be and it is only getting worse.

I wish you luck, you are in for a fight.

 

Dad is 84 and i have a feeling he doesn't have much longer behind the wheel. He hasn't got into any accidents with other vehicles that was his fault, Just seems to get in accidents with stationary objects over the last year

It will be a sad day for him when he gives up driving, i don't know what he will do. He gets up at 5 am every morning is gone from his house by 6am, Goes and eats breakfast, then walmart and library. Comes home around 2 pm and stays. He will go nuts not being able to go anywhere.

While we were on vacation he suffered a stroke around 530 am.. He didn't want to call the ambulance because he didn't want to get billed (he was told insurance wouldn't pay for it, Which is totally wrong) . So he got in the SUV and drove himself to the ER, Made it without any problems, Thank God.

Driving is his freedom and he still enjoys it, just hope he realizes its not going to last forever. Still to this day he tells me about some light to light races he gets into.. There has been several time's i have been on the main drag and seen him hauling *** away from the redlight wide open.

 

After her last accidents (I say accidents because she had two over the span of a few weeks) the State of Minnesota made her take an eye exam and a driving test. How she passed either of them I have no clue, since she is now as blind as a bat and was a horrible driver even when she was young! However, she pretty much waived her passed vision and driving exams in our faces at the time since we had started telling her then that it was time to give up the car.....

If nothing else, I'm thinking after this last episode that her insurance might now become so prohibitively expensive that she is forced to leave her driving days behind her.....

 

My Mom was grounded from driving years ago when she backed her Cadillac into the front door at a Sams store. Lucky she didn't run over anyone. My Dad was grounded after he had a stroke in his early 80's and he didn't like it one bit!

 

Both of my parents are in their mid 80's. my mom chose to stop driving 5 years ago and my dad still drives. So far, there have been no incidents and he is a good driver.
He knows that soon, he will have to stop driving and that is okay with him.

 

the system..government. Do you really want more laws telling us common sense stuff?

 

My 83 year old soon to be 84 Grandfather still works his land (25 acres) and tows with his pickup when needed. He's has 3 cars over the last 15 years which were always planned to be his last purchase. He stands straight and works some. Only a few hours a day. We have tried to limit his night driving.

 

Last year I got t-boned by an 82 yr old woman in a Town Car who got the gas pedal and the brake pedal confused. It was at the entrance to Walmart and no one was hurt. Did about $6500 damage to my 05 Dodge Magnum.

 

You're in a pretty tough situation there David. Oh, and you're not alone as you can see. Getting older folks to give up their right to drive is a fairly prickly topic. Nobody wants to admit that they're too old to get around on their own anymore. And any attempt to restrict old folks right to drive - such as mandatory re-testing if you're over a certain age - always meets with voter rage. Seems that senior citizens are a fairly powerful lobby. Of course they regularly prove this by driving right into the lobby of various buildings.

 

We call them Blue Hairs. They had an old lady in a Benz that was 2nd in line to get onto the Balboa ferry and got the gas and brake confused. Pushed the rented Astro van right into the drink. Nobody was hurt, but the people with the rented van were on vacation and had to be fished out of the Balboa Bay.

Yes you are in a tough situation, getting them to give up their driving is like putting a cat in a trash can, but if you don't address it things could be a lot worse than hurt pride. I wish you all the luck in the world and hope it works out well for ALL involved.

 

for those of us not there yet, i think this is a great resorce .

http://assets.aarp.org/www.aarp.org_...a66r2_care.pdf

i know i dont want to be a burden to anyone and if there is a chance my driving could cause lose to another, get me of today say get me off the road.