Cop following me when driving

Don’t be hard on yourself, Wave. Dealing with cops always makes me extremely paranoid too. It’s just the nature of the beast.

I’m glad that you’re feeling more positive about it today. Keep up the positivity :slight_smile:

Blessings,

Anthony

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I had an officer follow me for 10 miles on my way home from work. It made me so nervous, I thought my accelerator foot was going to bounce off the pedal. Eventually, when I turned, he went straight. But, true, we need to remind ourselves that they are only doing their job and if they seem unduly scornful one just has to think of some of the scumballs they have to deal with on a daily basis.

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It happened to me too, when I was about 17 years old. Me and a friend were coming home from Santa Cruz around

1:00 am . We got off the freeway and a cop got on our tail. We were probably drunk or stoned, because in those days that’s what we always did when we were in our cars. The cop stayed behind us all the way to my street, about 6 or 7 miles. When we parked out in front of my house the cop turned around and left. It was pretty weird.I don’t know what the cop was thinking or why he did it.

Don’t worry about it Wave, there are way too many more REALLY important things to worry about. Relax, give yourself a break. It was a non-incident. I get paranoid about cops and I’ve been pulled over a million times and I have gotten more than a dozen tickets and a few warnings. After I drive off after being pulled over, I kick myself for getting caught and I worry about paying the ticket. If I get off with a warning. I thank my lucky stars and I am more careful for a day or so and then I don’t worry about it anymore. It happened, I got lucky, end of story. Getting pulled over once or twice a year is a fact of life. It happens to everybody. The funny thing about cops is a line I heard off the TV show "COPS’. The police like to say that when they drive around city streets, they see the best drivers. Because when anybody sees a cop near them they automatically get on their best behaviur and slow down, and use their blinkers. LOL. Everyone gets paranoid and they don’t want a ticket.

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Yes, cops can be good guys depending on the circumstances. If you are not causing any trouble they usually let you alone. But yeah, he had a valid reason to pull you over and he saved you a couple hundred dollars or whatever the fine is by letting you go with a warning. But cops see the worst in people most of the time. They get lied to constantly, they get attacked, they get in fights. believe me, cops have a little paranoia themselves going on when they are dealing with the public. They see the worst people in society doing the worst things. If you treat them with respect, you will likely get the same treatment right back to you. There are jerks in every line of work, but when I hear people lump ALL cops together as people to hate, I tend to think it’s not the cops doing anything wrong it is the person who is constantly breaking the law. It’s simple: don’t break the law and 90% of the time, cops will leave you alone and do their job helping people and taking criminals and predators off the street.

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Oh wow this reminds me of my super paranoid, unmedicated days. I used to always think whoever was behind me while driving was following me. It was just always there, this delusion that I was probably being followed.

To everyone - thanks for the valuable advice and support. I was a little hard on myself due to the paranoia.
My therapist said even non SZ get a bit paranoid when dealing with cops. But us SZ can take it to the extreme sometimes I guess.
Thanks again I really appreciate it

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