So you have never driven a car before.....

[Greenbaum 12,259]

Plan on getting frustrated so learn to hold it inside. Calm is the best thing. I know, been there done that. Taught my wife. Took about a year. Now she drives everywhere as long as she has her gps. I started out letting her drive on the weekends and nights at the local High School parking lot. It's big and wide open.

Good luck.

[Brassballs 47]

Start in a parking lot. Start, stop, left and right turns/circles, reverse, etc. I started with engine idle speed and finally got the nerve up to explain what the other pedal on the floor was for, haha.

From there we progressed to neighborhood driving, just wondering around, trying to get lost. Then eventual forays onto other oncoming traffic streets. So far I've only had to replace 2 rims when she tangled with curbs. Fortunately no poles yet. She had a tendency unknown to my casual observation to turn the wheel while checking the rear view mirror. Finally broke that habit.

She now needs to practice the Ohio maneuverability course before final testing. I tried it to demo for her and was challenged myself. Harder than parallel parking if you ask me.

But her confidence increases daily. She now says her driving prayer only 4 out 5 times before starting the engine.

[dpd 21]

I have know this day will come, and it is getting closer everyday. I already bought my wife a car, a 2010 because I know it is going to get dinged up lol. Being from the south and growing up in the country, I had my first car at 14 years old, and as most of us Americans had a permit and was a legal driver at the appropriate time, even taught a few of my friends to drive. So I know this is gonna get hairy, anybody care to share their experiences teaching their asawa to drive here in the states? Any advice besides patience? haha

You gotta have a lot of patience to your wife. My hubby is teaching me how to drive here in California and he always lost his patience LOL. Sometimes he would scream because he gets afraid of me driving too fast like im on a race and not paying attention to the breaks. He would always tell me, "baby listen to me, if I say STOP please STOP! Step on the Breaks!!! Lol. Been driving around the neighboorhood but not in the highway yet until he's comfortable with me doing it. He would buy a second hand car for now and will buy a new one once im already expert. Probably in a month or two.

[cristina16 81]

i am excited to drive my fiance's titan! I am driving for over 10 years now with Philippine traffic and PH roads. I cannot wait driving on a freeway although driven through NLEX and SCTEX several times, I am from Central Luzon. I am sure he will be yelling - speed up! lolzz.. We are used to driving what? not even 20mph on inner roads and express way is only 60-65mph or lower.

I was driving around the city when he was here and he was yelling "why are these people not using the sidewalks!"

[Brassballs 47]

You gotta have a lot of patience to your wife. My hubby is teaching me how to drive here in California and he always lost his patience LOL. Sometimes he would scream because he gets afraid of me driving too fast like im on a race and not paying attention to the breaks. He would always tell me, "baby listen to me, if I say STOP please STOP! Step on the Breaks!!! Lol. Been driving around the neighboorhood but not in the highway yet until he's comfortable with me doing it. He would buy a second hand car for now and will buy a new one once im already expert. Probably in a month or two.

Now that is confidence!!!!!!

[QueenComley 295]

We too also live in the South and when I first moved here we lived in a tiny town on the delta bluff with no shops or amenities within walking distance.....to live here you HAVE to drive. But there was one problem... I had not driven for years. When I lived in the UK a 17 tonne truck slammed into me and despite walking away from the incident without a scratch (how I got that lucky I will never know), I was left traumatized and never drove ever again. Fast forward a few years later and here I was, In America refusing to drive. My husband took my for a drive down to the Mississippi river one sunday afternoon and on the way back he just stopped his truck in the middle of no-where, got out, walked around to my side of the door, handed me the keys and said "either you drive us home or we are stuck here for good". Tough love but he made me do it. A huge red neck truck, driving on the opposite of the road, stick shift gears and a complete fear of driving..... but I got us home. I have never looked back since......That was about 3 or 4 years ago LOL! Now I love driving.

[Caryh 5,206]

My wife had a car and drove in the Philippines. Learning to drive in the USA consisted of learning to follower actual rules and getting rid of a lot of bad habits. Also learning to drive fast, as we have roads built for higher speeds that are not loaded with pedestrians, tricycles, scooters, carts, jeepneys, and cars. Now she has no issue getting around, but she's horrible about directions. The only places she drives are places I teach her the routes to. She doesn't like GPS for some reason, and if she's trying to get somewhere she doesn't know or gets lost, I give her directions over the phone as I track her with find my phone. She says I'm her GPS whenever I say she should learn to use it.

[nngrl 2]

never drove a car in the philippines before. a friend taught me in the states. he handed me the keys to his truck (automatic) and basically told me to drive. start the engine and press gas. LOL. i manage to not ding his car. thank goodness. ?

[jg121783 3,909]

It's funny. My wife and I were discussing this subject the other day. I am about to send in her I-130 so we have some time yet but eventually I will have to teach her how to drive. She wants to get a job as soon as possible because we have goals of buying some property out in the country. The only problem is public transportation doesn't exist where I live so you have to drive to get pretty much anywhere. She asked me if she could take driving lessons in the Philippines before she gets here. After seeing the way people drive there (mostly around Manila) I didn't think that was a good idea because she might develop bad habits. By the way I have driven in blizzard conditions on many ocassions and I would be afraid to drive in Manila. It is like traffic lights don't exist. We were riding a bus to Manila one time and a trip that should have taken 45 minutes took 6 hours because traffic was so bad. I actually saw one of the workers on the bus get off at most intersections and go out and direct traffic just to get the bus through the intersection hahaha. I also saw people on motorcycles decide the sidewalk was a good way to get around backed up traffic.

So I told my wife it is better if she waits until she gets here. My plan is to take her to a big empty parking lot until she gets used to driving the car then go out on roads that arent busy and work up from there. I just bought a new car with AWD that will basically beome hers as soon as I fix my beater 4wd truck and she is ready to drive. I'm working on getting her to let me buy a diesel lol. The thing I worry about is her driving on slipery roads. I have been doing it most of my life and have had some close calls myself.

[Brassballs 47]

My wife had a car and drove in the Philippines. Learning to drive in the USA consisted of learning to follower actual rules and getting rid of a lot of bad habits. Also learning to drive fast, as we have roads built for higher speeds that are not loaded with pedestrians, tricycles, scooters, carts, jeepneys, and cars. Now she has no issue getting around, but she's horrible about directions. The only places she drives are places I teach her the routes to. She doesn't like GPS for some reason, and if she's trying to get somewhere she doesn't know or gets lost, I give her directions over the phone as I track her with find my phone. She says I'm her GPS whenever I say she should learn to use it.

Now that's funny!!!!!

[DarrenRachel 5]

I am nervous about this too. Maybe we will have many hours of GTA and Need for speed in our future. Hahaha

[Caryh 5,206]

She asked me if she could take driving lessons in the Philippines before she gets here. After seeing the way people drive there (mostly around Manila) I didn't think that was a good idea because she might develop bad habits.

My wife had a car and drove in the Philippines, and yes your wife is going to learn bad habits if she learns to drive there. Half the hurdle of my wife getting her license in the USA was teaching her how not to drive like its the Philippines. I actually bought her some behind the wheel lessons to get her through that, when I learned she doesn't listen well to my instructions, and I'm not the most patient teacher either. Something about her wanting to slow down on freeways because the cars going by her so fast scared her, totally scared the carp out of me. Another example is me telling her rolling through a stop sign or stop light was illegal and would earn her tickets plus a failed test here. Her reply was well no one is coming so it shouldn't matter if she stops. The driving instructor just said "Juna, Stop means Stop", and she listened to him. Now why didn't I say that? Another positive was driving instructor was very focused on the skills she needed to pass the test. Getting her the behind the wheel training saved me a ton of stress and she passed first try.

[Phil&Mich 36]

my now husband started to teach me drive over a year ago already, we were still engaged by that time.. we never encountered a problem,

and since I'm just staying at home, I only drive once in awhile just to touch the steering wheels, but last week, when I was driving from the gym, he asked

me to take a new route and I miss calculated my turn and drove in a curb, it was the very first time I heard him yell at me, it made me very nervous but

I still managed to bring us back home. inside our house I started crying and I cant control my body shaking.. Told him I will never ever drive again and asked him

to look a new house in the country lol.. now He's looking car for me. he said he better buy me my own car lol..

[dianecmea 1]

I didn't learn to drive until about 1 year and 3 months after I arrived in the US. Hubby did not teach me. I was pretty sure it would end up in a fight.

We paid for 2-2 hour sessions... didn't cost much. Instructor made me sit in the driver's seat and told me to drive. Boy was he surprised I had no idea how to even move from park to drive. So he drove to an empty school parking lot, and I learned the basics (park, reverse, drive, etc), and then I drove in circles in the parking lot for about an hour. Instructor promised me at the beginning that he would not make me drive the car home, but he broke his promise! He tricked me and said to drive out of the parking lot but we would turn around and come back. Well, he made me drive all the way home! He even made me stop at a gas station, and maneuvering the car to turn and not hit the garbage can and pole by the pumps was just nerve wracking

The 2nd session, just went to DMV and practiced parallel parking. Spent last part of the session just driving around the neighborhood.

It really was just the driving around practicing before the test that really helped. Every change I get I would drive, hubby would not drive at all. Hubby endured the stress of being my passenger just so I can practice. Also practiced parallel parking for like 4 Sundays at the DMV. I'm proud to say I did not ding nor scratch the car, not even a bit (and we only have 1 car)!

I've been driving for almost 8 years now, and I still hate merging in the highways.

So you can teach her to drive. But the moment that one or both you gets frustrated, stop. It may be better to pay someone else to teach her. Then encourage her to just keep driving, be patient, don't yell, and tell her to not just pay attention to what she's doing, but the other drivers as well (learned that the hard way).

[Penny Pincher 11]

My wife is waaaay more good driver than me. She never had no tickets at all. I was surprised when she came to USA and we drove to the city. I'm a bad driver in doing parallel parking. Of course, I will not attempt to do it in the city and so our choice was to go in the paid parking area but there was no free spot. She then saw a spot but I should do it thru parallel parking, my wife saw me sweating lol and asked, you want me to do it? I was like, you have no DL yet and I was afraid you bump those two cars. I was so shocked! She did it in few seconds and without me blinking my eyes. I really never saw her driving before we got married because there are different kinds of transportation in Phils and UK.

So, my advice.. have her driving skills in Philippines first so she have a clue when she gets here. She can learn basic within a day then have her learn the traffic rules here.