If you are frightened of driving, read this before you book

A good proportion of people who call us open with some version of "I'm probably going to be your worst student." Some have had a bad experience with a previous instructor. Some had a crash. Some have simply put it off for fifteen years and the putting-off has become the problem.

What we do differently on a first lesson

We do not go near traffic. The first lesson for an anxious learner happens in a quiet industrial estate on a Sunday, and the goal is not to drive — it is to sit in the driver's seat and find that nothing bad happens.

We agree a stop word before we set off. You say it, we pull over, no discussion, no disappointment. Knowing you can stop is usually what makes stopping unnecessary.

What actually helps

• Two-hour lessons, less often. Short lessons keep you permanently in the first-fifteen-minutes panic.
• The same route repeatedly at first. Novelty is the enemy early on; it stops being the enemy later.
• Naming the fear out loud. "I am scared of the roundabout at the end of this road" is a workable problem. Generalised dread is not.

When it is not really driving anxiety

Occasionally it is a panic disorder that happens to show up in the car, and the right answer is a GP rather than more lessons. We will say so if we think it, and we will not keep taking your money.