Hullo Paul and Helen
Hopefully this will help :-)
1. Have you got a 6x4 or smaller trailer - a garden sized one is ideal. Even a wheelbarrow will do to explain the principle.
Pick up the hitch (or the handles of the wheelbarrow) and push the trailer backwards (forwards for the wheelbarrow). To turn it, what do you do? You move the hitch (or handles) sideways in the opposite direction to that you want the trailer (wheelbarrow) to go.
That is, if you want to turn it to the right, you move the hitch to the left. It is the same for a caravan.
2. You are backing your tow vehicle. If someone asked you to move the towball to the right, what would you do? You would move the front of the car to the left. (As the hitch is to the rear of the back wheels). So, left hand down the towball goes to the left, right hand down, the towball goes to the right.
Thus if you want the trailer or caravan to go to the right, you need to push the hitch to the left by moving the steering wheel down on the left.
It helps to focus primarily on what the hitch needs to do, not the car.
If you follow these 2 simple rules, backing a trailer or caravan is more straight forward.
Note that when a person gets flustered, they tend to lose the ability to think logically. Stop, take a deep breath, get out of the car and if it helps, walk around to appraise the situation and work out what needs to happen to the hitch - does it need to go to the left or right?. Then hop back in and, with the hitch in still in mind, go either left or right hand down.
Lastly, try to arrange it so that you are reversing on the right hand side. That is, as you reverse into
the spot you have selected (or been allocated) you can see down the side of the van as you turn to go in. If you reverse to the left, it is your blind side and much trickier.
Practice to give yourself confidence. Maybe in a wide
open space with poles in the ground to define the space to back in to.
Good luck
Andrew
PS If you know someone with a ride on mower and a garden trailer, have a go reversing using these. If you can confidently reverse using these, you can reverse anything :-)