Intro
This is my car. It's a 1999 Honda Odyssey.
I love this car. I was around 10 when we bought it. My parents buy cars new, pay for them in as full as possible, take impeccable care of them, and drive them into the ground. So it was, in fact, the car I learned to drive on. I failed my first driving test in it, and passed the second easily. It has, as of this moment, clocked 137,000 miles.
It is terminally broken. One of the things my parents told me (probably my dad) was that you can only realistically keep a car so long. Even if you take impeccable care of a car, there comes a point where it's not worth it, monetarily, to keep repairing it. This car is worth perhaps $1,000 (generously), and the repairs I'd need to make cost a lot more than that. Terminally broken.
In short, I am really sad. In terms of nostalgia, the car is priceless. If I was rolling in piles of money, I would probably repair it merely because of that. Since I'm not, I'm going to have to look for a new car.
So that fact, and Chris, got me thinking about the fact that I have a car, have a license, and can drive.
I wasn't to know this until much later, but I became a statistical outlier when I got my license at the age of 17. As it turns out, people on the autism spectrum often don't get their licenses. Instead, we take the bus, carpool, walk, and bike. This is for a number of reasons.
Driving (Safely) is Complicated
First, driving is a dizzying experience, if you don't know what to look for. Everything you have to look at is moving (except your speedometer). Some things outside the car are moving independently of you, at variable speeds. You need to pay attention to those. You need to pay attention to all the signs (and know where they are, and what they mean at a glance). You need to pay attention to the road lines so you can stay in them. All of that, simultaneously. That's when things are all going right. Try doing that with sensory issues.
Now add other people into the equation. There are set laws for driving, which you can learn. They don't change. Unfortunately, like any other environment, there are also unwritten rules. For example, while the law clearly states you need to come to a complete stop at a stop sign, when was the last time you (or whoever drove you last) trundled up to a stop sign, slowed down until you could feel your car halt completely in place, waited a half second to make sure the intersection was clear, and then went?
Unless you're a very conservative driver or a very new driver, I'm going to bet your answer is, "it's been awhile." That's because almost no one follows that particular rule, not even the police. And it's not high on their priority to enforce, so with few exceptions, nobody cares about it. So instead of coming to a complete stop like the law says, we slow down enough to make sure the intersection is clear, wait our turn if needed, and then roll right through the stop sign.
I learned about this unwritten rule by watching other drivers, using observation skills I honed trying to learn social skills. There are many others. Makes it kind of difficult and frustrating for someone who's trying to adhere to the written rules, when everybody around you is breaking them.
You also need to know where you're going. If you're going someplace new, you need directions. I used to print out directions before I went someplace new, because while I can read a map, I can't do so quickly. All the new roads, highways, and intersections are disorienting. I presently use an app called Waze on my tablet, which is like those dashboard GPSes but less irritating and with more features. You can also use Google Maps or Apple Maps or any other driving app. This takes a lot of anxiety out of my drive, because I no longer really need to know where I'm going. If I get lost, I will stay lost for exactly the amount of time it takes the app to re-orient itself and plot a new route. That's usually under 5 seconds. A great improvement from driving around town, lost, for an hour.
Getting a License is Tricky
Second on the list for keeping autistic people from having a car and license, the licensing process itself. Your state many vary, but mine made me have a certain number of hours driving with a passenger. That meant needing to find an adult willing to sit in a car with me while I drove, for an hour at a time, for lots of hours. That isn't always feasible for people on the autism spectrum. They may not have older siblings, or parents with enough free time to manage those hours. My poor mother thankfully had enough time to polish off some of those hours, and driver's ed did the rest.
At the time, the state didn't require driver's ed, but on the insistence of my parents, I attended it anyway. I wasn't sorry I did. My teachers weren't the nicest people, but they absolutely knew what they were teaching, and they cared. Most of the kids learning there didn't care, and admittedly, many of the videos they showed us were as annoying as they were informative. But I stuck with it, and tried to keep a better attitude about it than my classmates, and eventually it was over. They spent a number of hours with me in the car, helping me reach the required hours for the test.
I found the classroom and my peers kind of exhausting. They were all my age, and the vast majority of them must have been forced there by their parents, because they made a game of ignoring the teacher. I sat quietly and didn't join in, because while I thought I deserved to drive, I wasn't dumb enough to think I already knew everything. But I was used to being an outcast, so while they were busy being rude to the teachers, they didn't have any spare effort to spend on being rude to me.
In the end, the experience was a bit of trial. I passed the written portion of the driving test with above a 90%, which was far above the minimum bar at the time. My teachers were impressed. I was crabby because I felt I'd tested poorly. But I did learn the material, and wouldn't have if I'd simply studied the laws of driving or the poorly-written state literature on the subject.
Driver's ed costs money, unfortunately, which can be hard to come by for families already shelling out money for medication, counseling, ABA, and other services. I do think it's a wise investment, especially since some driving schools will now cater to developmental disabilities/differences.
Owning a Car is Expensive
Third and finally, have you seen car insurance prices? Or how much a not-badly-used car costs? I read somewhere recently that people, not autistic people, just people in general, aren't putting down 20% on their cars anymore. They're putting down 15%, or 10%, or whatever they can afford. People, in general, simply can't afford as much as they used to.
It's already difficult for people on the autism spectrum to get a job, but trying to pay for all of that on minimum wage is impossible. I was fortunate enough to have a sympathetic grandmother and parents, and so I didn't have to pay scads of money for my cars thus far. But the car insurance has been all mine, and it has not been cheap. I haven't gotten into any accidents, and I have a number of discounts due to driving history, seat belt usage, paperless bills, etc. But it's still a good chunk of change.
I'm now having to look at used cars, and they're also a good chunk of change. I'm probably looking at $10k or so for a reliable used car. I'll go into my buying process later (probably next Friday), but it's not going to be a simple affair. You should never simply buy a car because of how it looks. But whatever car I end up picking, I'm going to have to take out a loan. I can't afford to plunk down $10,000 without flinching.
The cost of the car and the insurance aren't even the whole story for car costs. There's car washes, which are a necessity where I live. It snows heavily here, and so they salt the roads with really corrosive stuff. All of which ends up on your car, and proceeds to rust through your car's underbelly unless you get it washed off.
There's basic maintenance: oil changes, windshield wipers, air filters, and other fluids like coolant, power steering fluid, and washer fluid. My car in specific requires checks on specific areas every 10,000 miles or so, and more thorough checks every 20,000 and 30,000. And of course, there's gasoline, the ever-fluctuating money-devourer.
This all adds up rather fast. A lot of families can't afford to hand off a car to their burgeoning young adult on the spectrum, or find a cheap used car to start them with. The insurance is an added monthly drain that isn't sustainable on a lot of budgets. The maintenance is expensive, and that's if your car doesn't break at all, and you don't get into an accident.
In the end, it doesn't really surprise me that the vast majority of my peers don't drive, or only drive in a limited capacity.
This is my car. It's a 1999 Honda Odyssey.
I love this car. I was around 10 when we bought it. My parents buy cars new, pay for them in as full as possible, take impeccable care of them, and drive them into the ground. So it was, in fact, the car I learned to drive on. I failed my first driving test in it, and passed the second easily. It has, as of this moment, clocked 137,000 miles.
It is terminally broken. One of the things my parents told me (probably my dad) was that you can only realistically keep a car so long. Even if you take impeccable care of a car, there comes a point where it's not worth it, monetarily, to keep repairing it. This car is worth perhaps $1,000 (generously), and the repairs I'd need to make cost a lot more than that. Terminally broken.
In short, I am really sad. In terms of nostalgia, the car is priceless. If I was rolling in piles of money, I would probably repair it merely because of that. Since I'm not, I'm going to have to look for a new car.
So that fact, and Chris, got me thinking about the fact that I have a car, have a license, and can drive.
I wasn't to know this until much later, but I became a statistical outlier when I got my license at the age of 17. As it turns out, people on the autism spectrum often don't get their licenses. Instead, we take the bus, carpool, walk, and bike. This is for a number of reasons.
Driving (Safely) is Complicated
First, driving is a dizzying experience, if you don't know what to look for. Everything you have to look at is moving (except your speedometer). Some things outside the car are moving independently of you, at variable speeds. You need to pay attention to those. You need to pay attention to all the signs (and know where they are, and what they mean at a glance). You need to pay attention to the road lines so you can stay in them. All of that, simultaneously. That's when things are all going right. Try doing that with sensory issues.
Now add other people into the equation. There are set laws for driving, which you can learn. They don't change. Unfortunately, like any other environment, there are also unwritten rules. For example, while the law clearly states you need to come to a complete stop at a stop sign, when was the last time you (or whoever drove you last) trundled up to a stop sign, slowed down until you could feel your car halt completely in place, waited a half second to make sure the intersection was clear, and then went?
Unless you're a very conservative driver or a very new driver, I'm going to bet your answer is, "it's been awhile." That's because almost no one follows that particular rule, not even the police. And it's not high on their priority to enforce, so with few exceptions, nobody cares about it. So instead of coming to a complete stop like the law says, we slow down enough to make sure the intersection is clear, wait our turn if needed, and then roll right through the stop sign.
I learned about this unwritten rule by watching other drivers, using observation skills I honed trying to learn social skills. There are many others. Makes it kind of difficult and frustrating for someone who's trying to adhere to the written rules, when everybody around you is breaking them.
You also need to know where you're going. If you're going someplace new, you need directions. I used to print out directions before I went someplace new, because while I can read a map, I can't do so quickly. All the new roads, highways, and intersections are disorienting. I presently use an app called Waze on my tablet, which is like those dashboard GPSes but less irritating and with more features. You can also use Google Maps or Apple Maps or any other driving app. This takes a lot of anxiety out of my drive, because I no longer really need to know where I'm going. If I get lost, I will stay lost for exactly the amount of time it takes the app to re-orient itself and plot a new route. That's usually under 5 seconds. A great improvement from driving around town, lost, for an hour.
Getting a License is Tricky
Second on the list for keeping autistic people from having a car and license, the licensing process itself. Your state many vary, but mine made me have a certain number of hours driving with a passenger. That meant needing to find an adult willing to sit in a car with me while I drove, for an hour at a time, for lots of hours. That isn't always feasible for people on the autism spectrum. They may not have older siblings, or parents with enough free time to manage those hours. My poor mother thankfully had enough time to polish off some of those hours, and driver's ed did the rest.
At the time, the state didn't require driver's ed, but on the insistence of my parents, I attended it anyway. I wasn't sorry I did. My teachers weren't the nicest people, but they absolutely knew what they were teaching, and they cared. Most of the kids learning there didn't care, and admittedly, many of the videos they showed us were as annoying as they were informative. But I stuck with it, and tried to keep a better attitude about it than my classmates, and eventually it was over. They spent a number of hours with me in the car, helping me reach the required hours for the test.
I found the classroom and my peers kind of exhausting. They were all my age, and the vast majority of them must have been forced there by their parents, because they made a game of ignoring the teacher. I sat quietly and didn't join in, because while I thought I deserved to drive, I wasn't dumb enough to think I already knew everything. But I was used to being an outcast, so while they were busy being rude to the teachers, they didn't have any spare effort to spend on being rude to me.
In the end, the experience was a bit of trial. I passed the written portion of the driving test with above a 90%, which was far above the minimum bar at the time. My teachers were impressed. I was crabby because I felt I'd tested poorly. But I did learn the material, and wouldn't have if I'd simply studied the laws of driving or the poorly-written state literature on the subject.
Driver's ed costs money, unfortunately, which can be hard to come by for families already shelling out money for medication, counseling, ABA, and other services. I do think it's a wise investment, especially since some driving schools will now cater to developmental disabilities/differences.
Owning a Car is Expensive
Third and finally, have you seen car insurance prices? Or how much a not-badly-used car costs? I read somewhere recently that people, not autistic people, just people in general, aren't putting down 20% on their cars anymore. They're putting down 15%, or 10%, or whatever they can afford. People, in general, simply can't afford as much as they used to.
It's already difficult for people on the autism spectrum to get a job, but trying to pay for all of that on minimum wage is impossible. I was fortunate enough to have a sympathetic grandmother and parents, and so I didn't have to pay scads of money for my cars thus far. But the car insurance has been all mine, and it has not been cheap. I haven't gotten into any accidents, and I have a number of discounts due to driving history, seat belt usage, paperless bills, etc. But it's still a good chunk of change.
I'm now having to look at used cars, and they're also a good chunk of change. I'm probably looking at $10k or so for a reliable used car. I'll go into my buying process later (probably next Friday), but it's not going to be a simple affair. You should never simply buy a car because of how it looks. But whatever car I end up picking, I'm going to have to take out a loan. I can't afford to plunk down $10,000 without flinching.
The cost of the car and the insurance aren't even the whole story for car costs. There's car washes, which are a necessity where I live. It snows heavily here, and so they salt the roads with really corrosive stuff. All of which ends up on your car, and proceeds to rust through your car's underbelly unless you get it washed off.
There's basic maintenance: oil changes, windshield wipers, air filters, and other fluids like coolant, power steering fluid, and washer fluid. My car in specific requires checks on specific areas every 10,000 miles or so, and more thorough checks every 20,000 and 30,000. And of course, there's gasoline, the ever-fluctuating money-devourer.
This all adds up rather fast. A lot of families can't afford to hand off a car to their burgeoning young adult on the spectrum, or find a cheap used car to start them with. The insurance is an added monthly drain that isn't sustainable on a lot of budgets. The maintenance is expensive, and that's if your car doesn't break at all, and you don't get into an accident.
In the end, it doesn't really surprise me that the vast majority of my peers don't drive, or only drive in a limited capacity.
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