3 dui's in mi

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The new law in michigan for 3 dui's, over the entire life of u r drivers license, is MANDATORY 5 yrs loss of license. My girlfriend is going through this and had to take an apt. near the hospital so she could walk to work. Lives too far for her SO to drive her everyday. Stays all week near the hospital and goes home on the weekends.

Specializes in critical care, PACU.

in response to someone's post about using a limo and how you felt sorry for the driver...

my bf says in the air force they had this program called "airmen on wheels" or something like that where you would "volunteer" to go pick up drunk airmen, but they canceled it because people just used it as a free taxi service from one bar to the next. The worst part was, you used your own gas, your own car, and it was your car they vomited in. :chuckle

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I just have to say something to this. I would never ever drive drunk at this point in my life. If I do drink I always have someone sober to drive me home. However, the only reason I made a commitment to never drive drunk is because my husband had lost his license for 3 DWIs and with 2 small kids, what kind of family would we be if no one could drive? I just could not risk it. Now my husband has been sober for 15 yrs now and has his license back but I still would never do it because I dont want to hurt anyone. When we were in our teens and early 20s however we partied with the best (or worst) of them and, like many young people did not anticipate any harm coming to anyone because of our actions.

I am such a completely different person now than I was when I was 21. My husband is as well. I am a good upstanding citizen, I never break the law, I have 2 great kids and a husband anyone would be proud of. I hate the idea of anyone giving up on me. Sometimes people make mistakes, that doesn't mean they can never be trusted again. People deserve a second chance, especially young people with a greater capacity for changing bad behavior than someone with a 30yr track record of bad decision making. I dont know how old the person in question is and I am not saying people should not suffer the consequences of their actions but jeez, cut people a break once in a while. You never know what someone has been through or why they do what they do.

I'm all for second chances, but those killed or injured by drunk drivers never get that. You husband was REALLY lucky he didn't kill or hurt someone. I'm glad he has his life together and has changed his ways. But it seemed it took taking away his license for him to decide what he was doing was wrong. That's what I don't understand - until it impacted him personally, he didn't learn. Why doesn't the fear of hurting others deter people? I not trying to pick on you, I honesty would like to know, because I have never understood the mentalilty of thinking it is ok?? And please don't give me the youth answer, because since I was 16, I KNEW that driving intoxicated was wrong and could hurt someone.

I do give him credit though...there are some that never seem to learn. Believe me I am truly glad that both of you are sober drivers now. :heartbeat

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the sheer arrogance and hypocrisy to the responses in this message are astounding. how many of you can honestly say that, at NO TIME in your life, you havent had more than 2 drinks and driven, even once? Driving intoxicated is not acceptable, nor should it be, but people make mistakes. i can only hope this girl gets help and can move on.

in response to the post of "how bout 1DUI=5 yr loss of license". are you serious? hopefully you never find yourself on the wrong side of the law. we'll see if you like an extreme punishment for a first offense. until you walk in someone else's skin, dont judge.

I can say that. I don't drive after one drink and I live in Las Vegas where I can get a drink any time of day. You are always responsible for your actions, call a friend, a parent, a cab, or go to sleep in your backseat, I don't care. You just don't drive after you drink.

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Specializes in acute rehab, med surg, LTC, peds, home c.
If someone pointed a loaded gun at another person and shot three times, regardless of whether he missed or not, he would go to jail. The same should apply to DUI's.

Your husband got lucky and never killed anyone. As someone who has lost people to drunk drivers, I have *no* tolerance for that. I don't care what's going on in your life, that behavior is unacceptable, and I think if the punishments were harsher, some of the people who do it casually would think twice, including teens. The people I lost were lost to a teenage drunk driver, and I wish he was rotting in jail, but instead he got off with a fine and a temporary license loss. Like somebody said before, driving drunk isn't just a mistake, it's a conscious choice that should be punished harshly.

America is too lenient with punishments some times. We have a higher BAC limit, lower fines, shorter license suspensions and shorter jail time than most other developed countries. Even Canada is harder on their DUI offenders than the US. We need to step up and start doing more than slapping the hands of repeat offenders...what they need is a slap in the face.

I am sorry for your loss and I understand now why you feel so strongly about DWIs. I would be outraged if I lost someone I loved to a drunk driver. I don't want to sound like I dont think it is a big deal. I guess what I am really trying to say is that decent people sometimes do incredibly stupid things. When you are young, you never think anything will happen to you. I know this is no excuse, especially when innocent people are hurt. I hope you are able to find some peace about the situation.

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Specializes in acute rehab, med surg, LTC, peds, home c.
I'm all for second chances, but those killed or injured by drunk drivers never get that. You husband was REALLY lucky he didn't kill or hurt someone. I'm glad he has his life together and has changed his ways. But it seemed it took taking away his license for him to decide what he was doing was wrong. That's what I don't understand - until it impacted him personally, he didn't learn. Why doesn't the fear of hurting others deter people? I not trying to pick on you, I honesty would like to know, because I have never understood the mentalilty of thinking it is ok?? And please don't give me the youth answer, because since I was 16, I KNEW that driving intoxicated was wrong and could hurt someone.

I do give him credit though...there are some that never seem to learn. Believe me I am truly glad that both of you are sober drivers now. :heartbeat

It often takes a monumental event to get an addict into recovery. This is what did it for him. He went straight into a court ordered month long tx program as well as a short stint in the county jail and community service etc. Also, awareness of the dangers of DD is a relatively new development. At the time we were drinking it was just starting to be publicized as a real threat to safety. He was 23 when he got the 3rd one and had grown up with a father that was drunk more often than not.

I dont know why the 1st one didn't slap him into reality but it didn't. We are both so different now and we cant believe half the stuff we did when we were younger.

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It often takes a monumental event to get an addict into recovery. This is what did it for him. He went straight into a court ordered month long tx program as well as a short stint in the county jail and community service etc. Also, awareness of the dangers of DD is a relatively new development. At the time we were drinking it was just starting to be publicized as a real threat to safety. He was 23 when he got the 3rd one and had grown up with a father that was drunk more often than not.

I dont know why the 1st one didn't slap him into reality but it didn't. We are both so different now and we cant believe half the stuff we did when we were younger.

Thanks for sharing. If addiction was involved that would explain why the first one didn't change him. I'm thinking more of the run of the mill social drinker that thinks nothing of climbing in a car after drinking. Although I do have to disagree that DD is a relatively new development. In '78 when I learned to drive, I knew than that drinking and driving did not mix. But now that I aged myself ;) , I am glad that your husband was able to beat his addiction - it isn't an easy thing to do.

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Specializes in Clinical Research, Outpt Women's Health.

I still think it is very strange that the original post was so vague, not really a question or a statement, and the poster never came back. What purpose does it serve?

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Wow, reading alot of these uncompastionate, over zealous posts just gets my blood boiling. To look at someone as so bad for getting dui's without looking at them from the view point of a nurse is so brain scrambling. People come from different backgrounds, childhoods, experiences, and have issues that do concern alcohol addiction. Just because somene has a problem doesnt mean they wont and cant be great nurses. All this higher then art thou bullcrap I read is just astonishing from many of you. Your the kind of nurses that are at the nursing station bad mouthing the homeless IVD, or alcoholic, for their conditions. HOW DARE YOU! your entitled to your opinion, but this goes against everything nurses stands for in my opinion. For the Board to have a strict attitude toward it is different. its their decision to allow people to have a liscense, 2 or 3 duis, whatever have you based on what THEIR job entails as BRN. No one looks outside the box, we have cars with seat belts but no mechanisms standard measure to check for intoxication in cars. My lord people.

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You can have compassion for a person with an alcohol addiction but still believe their behavior and their judgment render them unfit to hold a position of responsibility.

Does that mean that such a person should never become a nurse or return to nursing if they have been disciplined? No. It means that they need to face their addiction, learn to manage their lives without alcohol (or drugs), and earn back the trust they forfeited by making harmful decisions.

To allow a nurse operating with a full-blown addiction--whether it be to alcohol or drugs--to hold other people's lives and well-being in their hands is to do a disservice to them and to their patients. Ifr they don't belong behind the wheel, they don't belong on a hospital unit while under the influence either. This isn't judgmental. It's reality.

For some, it takes the loss of their license--or at least that threat--to bring home the reality of what's at stake. Better to have the shock of BON discipline than manslaughter or homicide charges from drunk driving or on-the-job errors.

Again, this isn't condemnation of the person, only the recognition that impaired people aren't safe to drive or take care of patients.

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I am shock...that she is not in the hprp program in michigan.. This is a question of your board renewal? Has she told them

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