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@Anonymous wrote:

My mum had to have a medical recently and her eyes tested to see if she was still fit to drive. She is 84. I'm not sure what age you have to be in Holland to get tested, but it has been in place quite a while as far as I know.

She failed the test on her eyesight, but they are doing that test again soon to make sure for whatever reason.

She wasn't happy because although she doesn't drive much anymore she feels it as a loss to her independence. I understand that. But to be honest I don't think she should be driving anymore. After she was involved in a bad crash many years ago she first was afraid to drive again and when she finally started again she became a very nervous driver and passenger, while when she was young she loved to drive.

She thinks that because she doesn't go far she will be fine still driving, but the crash she had happened at the end of her road......

I feel sorry for her, but I think it's best if she never drives again. Her neighbour's son drives her everywhere she needs to go, helps her with her shopping etc.. and for that he has the use of her car for going to work and anything else he needs to do. He used to be a taxi driver. So a very good deal for both I would say.

But for her I think it's more the idea that she is not in control of her own life anymore that is the real issue.

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I have a similar tale to recall re. an elderly neighbour. She first had a driving licence at age 18 in 1931 (driving tests weren't introduced until '34). She drove an ambulance for the WRVS during the war and continued to drive for a living afterwards. She spent many years of her married life driving all over Europe on holidays as her husband never learned to drive. Spent her whole life with a clean licence having never had an accident.

When she reached her late sixties she decided to switch to driving an automatic as she had severe arthritis in her hands. As time went on her arthritis started to affect her spine but she kept on driving. She had to recline her driving seat so far back to alleviate her back pain that often she would drive by and you could hardly see her in the car she was sitting so low, it must have been almost impossible to see where she was going. Her family unwisely encouraged her to keep driving stressing the importance of her being independent but they all lived some distance away and secretly I think they were dreading the time when she had to stop getting around on her own as they would have to pitch in and help.

In later years she had a few minor bumps mainly in supermarket carparks, then she finally had to stop aged 93 after she drove onto someone's drive at quite a pelt and ran into the back of a Range Rover. My wife was with her at the time and they were both concussed and the car was a write off. She had been driving automatics for nearly thirty years and had never received any instruction, so she had always used the right foot for the throttle and the left for the brake. It's a minor wonder that she lived so long. Two years later she had to go into a retirement home suffering from dementia and unable to look after herself.