"Even though women account for over 40% of B-category driver's license holders, last year [2023] they were responsible for 28.2% of road accidents [compared to 69.2% for men]. Additionally, women are far less likely to cause fatal accidents. Men are responsible for deaths on the road eight times more often than women," said Maria Dąbrowska-Loranc, head of the Road Traffic Safety Center at ITS, quoted by *Autokult*. These statistics are sure to reassure many newly licensed female drivers (and hopefully inspire men to ease off the gas pedal). However, many women still don't feel entirely confident behind the wheel, especially when it comes to their first solo experiences.
Getting the license and hitting the gas? "I was so shaky, I parked the car 10 times"
First, the theory, then the practice, and once you get your license, you're good to go. It's natural that after receiving a driver's license, not everyone immediately feels completely confident. Not all situations are fully understood, and we don't always know how to react. Particularly when we have to quickly assess risks and act. Experience and automatic reactions come with time, but the road to mastering driving can be full of twists and turns.
Some of my interviewees shared their memories with me. Some have just recently gotten their licenses, while others have been driving for years. Despite the time difference, their experiences are remarkably similar.
"For my first drive after getting my license, I went out at seven in the morning on a Saturday. I hoped to avoid traffic and make it to the store peacefully," Magda started. "I turned on the radio and relaxed as I left the house. The trouble started when I had to cross the tram tracks. I saw the tram approaching, so I stopped to let it pass, but it was so close that I could see the worried look on the driver's face as he calculated whether he could safely pass me. That stressed me out so much that once the tracks were clear, my car stalled. I quickly got going again, but when I reached the underground parking lot, I was so shaken that I couldn't focus on parking and had to correct the car 10 times."
"When I finally managed to park and went into the store, I kept thinking about whether I had parked the car safely and whether it would still be there when I came back. And how I would manage to drive back... I loaded up my cart in 15 minutes and rushed back to the parking lot. When I got home, I had no idea what I had bought," Magda laughed.
"I was so excited, I drove the wrong way down a one-way street"
Ola had a similarly stressful experience. "Once, I parked nicely in a parking lot, and then a guy parked really close to me. Instead of driving straight out, I tried to move further away from him. The guy came out of the store and I still remember how he grabbed his head because I almost scratched his car. He started showing me which way to turn, and somehow I managed to get out. After that, I saw in my rearview mirror that he was still holding his head. It sounds funny now, but at the time, it was such a trauma, and I felt so embarrassed—oh, my God," she revealed.
"I was so excited after getting my license that while driving around Wyszków, I drove the wrong way down a one-way street, even though I knew how to drive there because it’s one of the main streets. I only realized it when I almost had a head-on collision with another car," laughed Ewelina, though she certainly wasn’t laughing at the time. After all, situations like that can end very differently. Just like what happened to a friend of my interviewee:
"She didn't unfold her side mirrors, which her dad had folded in earlier, and only realized once she was on the road that she couldn't pass anyone because she couldn't see anything," Ewelina added.
