Drunk and Doped Up Driving and ...Regret

We often report drunk driving and doped up driving deaths on this blog because drunk and dope related driving deaths are sudden, tragic and preventable.

Our ongoing nagging about drunk and impaired driving is perpetuated because people become complacent about impaired driving. If you drive to your local bar and get loaded and are able to drive back home without incident, you get a false sense of security. You start to feel that you can do this every time. 

You can't.  Over time, the odds are against you. You are a moving time bomb and you are driving a 4,000 pound weapon that can mow down everything in your path. 

A number of viewers of this blog have pointed out that many of the men and women who cause impaired driving deaths are extremely regretful, full of remorse, repentant, wracked with pain and guilt and are sad. Some are suicidal. 

Yes, they may be.  God help them. 

However, they are not as wracked with pain as the people who have lost their loved ones due to the impaired driving of another. Someone they loved and counted on is gone forever.  Their loved one is never coming home because someone was drunk and chose to drive. 

This is regret

Regret can last a lifetime.  An American author, Lisa See, stated that ....the cruelest words in the universe are "if only". And God knows there is no truer statement than that. 

Therefore let's all take this Sober Drivers Pledge:

• I pledge to always drive sober. I won't drive drunk or doped up. 
• I don't want regret and remorse to follow me all of the days of my life. 
• When I go out partying, I will come and go with a designated driver or by taxi, or will walk or bus it there and back.   
• If my friends, coworkers, family members or acquaintances are drinking or doing drugs and intend to drive, I will do everything within reason that I can to prevent them from doing so. 

God help us all.  Amen.