Most teens are very excited in anticipation to turn 16. Some might be nervous. All are normal feelings for them to have with this milestone.
Every one in a while, there may be a teen driver who is more than a little bit nervous. So much so that they are afraid to drive. This fear isn’t paralyzing, they will still get behind the wheel, but they are not able to relax into a natural driving mode. Instead, they are hyper-vigilant and visibly anxious.
Every parents know that asking a teenager what’s wrong is not a very effective to discovering their thoughts. Pay attention to the questions your teen is asking, that’s usually an in site to what could be bothering them. Or, you can ask your teen “what is your biggest fear right now?”
The answer to this question may be very revealing or it could start you down the path of identifying the real issue.
If a teen says “I have to pay for my own car insurance when I get my license, which means I’ll have to quit soccer to get a job,” this is a pretty clear cut problem. It could go a little deeper than that, like a teen’s bigger concern is not knowing how to approach their parents about the topic.
In other cases, getting to the bottom of the problem make take additional skills, “I’m afraid I’m going to crash through the guardrail and fly off the cliff.” This is a big fear, but doesn’t come out of thin air. There could be past traumatic events that lead the teen to thinking this or they are overwhelmed by the idea that they will get into one while driving.
When teen drivers have a real fear around driving, it’s important not to minimize those fears. Don’t tell them that it’s all in their head, or that this bad thing won’t happen to them, because it won’t make their fear go away. It will make them internalize the fear further because they won’t want to talk about it anymore.
Instead, try to bring everything into realistic frame of reference. Sometime talking more about the old accident and the factors that contributed to it. You can talk about how those factors can be avoided through safe driving skills and training.