--- title: "Patients Furious at Therapists Secretly Using AI" description: "Going to a real-life therapist is supposed to be an experience devoid of AI — which makes some mental health pros' AI use all the worse." date: "2025-09-04" modified: "2025-09-04" authors: - name: "Noor Al-Sibai" job_title: "Senior Staff Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/nooralsibai" url: "https://futurism.com/patients-furious-therapists-using-ai" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" tags: - "ai privacy" - "chatgpt" - "mental health" - "therapy" --- # Patients Furious at Therapists Secretly Using AI ![Going to a real-life therapist is supposed to be an experience devoid of AI — which makes some mental health pros' AI use all the worse.]() *\Image: Getty / Futurism\* With artificial intelligence integrating — or infiltrating — into every corner of our lives, some less-than-ethical mental health professionals have begun using it in secret, causing major trust issues for the vulnerable clients who pay them for their sensitivity and confidentiality. As [*MIT* *Technology Review* reports](), therapists have used OpenAI's ChatGPT and other large language models (LLMs) for everything from email and message responses to, in one particularly egregious case, suggesting questions to ask a patient mid-session. The patient who experienced the latter affront, a 31-year-old Los Angeles man that *Tech Review* identified only by the first name Declan, said that he was in the midst of a virtual session with his therapist when, upon the connection becoming scratchy, the client suggested they both turn off their cameras and speak normally. Instead of broadcasting a normal blank screen, however, Declan's therapist inadvertently shared his own — and "suddenly, I was watching \[the therapist\] use ChatGPT." "He was taking what I was saying and putting it into ChatGPT," the Angeleno told the magazine, "and then summarizing or cherry-picking answers." Flabbergasted, Declan didn't say anything about what he saw, instead choosing to watch ChatGPT as it analyzed what he was saying and spat out potential rejoinders for the therapist to use. At a certain point, he even began echoing the chatbot's responses, which the therapist seemed to view as some sort of breakthrough. "I became the best patient ever, because ChatGPT would be like, 'Well, do you consider that your way of thinking might be a little too black and white?'" Declan recounted, "And I would be like, 'Huh, you know, I think my way of thinking might be too black and white,' and \[my therapist would\] be like, '*Exactly*.' I’m sure it was his dream session." At their next meeting, Declan confronted his therapist, who fessed up to using ChatGPT in their sessions and started crying. It was "like a super awkward... weird breakup," Declan recounted to *Tech Review*, with the therapist even claiming that he'd used ChatGPT because he was out of ideas to help Declan and had hit a wall. (He still charged him for that final session.) Laurie Clarke, who penned the *Tech Review* piece, had had her own run-in with a therapist's shady AI use after getting an email much longer and "more polished" than usual. "I initially felt heartened," Clarke wrote. It seemed to convey a kind, validating message, and its length made me feel that she’d taken the time to reflect on all of the points in my (rather sensitive) email." It didn't take long for that once-affirming message to start to look suspicious to the tech writer. It had a different font than normal and used a bunch of what Clarke referred to as "Americanized em-dashes," which are not, to be fair, in standard use in the UK, where both she and her therapist are based. Her therapist responded by saying that she simply dictates her longer-length emails to AI, but the writer couldn't "entirely shake the suspicion that she might have pasted my highly personal email wholesale into ChatGPT" — and if that were true, she may well have [introduced a security risk]() to the sensitive, [protected mental health information]() contained within an otherwise confidential exchange. Understandably put off by the experience, Clarke took to Reddit, the Internet's public square, to see if others had caught their therapists using AI in similar ways. Along with connecting to Declan, she also learned the story of Hope, a 25-year-old American who sent her own therapist a direct message looking for support after her dog died. Hope got back an otherwise immaculate and seemingly heartfelt response about how difficult it must be "not having him by your side right now" — but then she noticed a prompt that the therapist had forgotten to erase sitting prominently at the top of the missive, providing the trained mental health professional a "more human, heartfelt \[response\] with a gentle, conversational tone." "It was just a very strange feeling," Hope told *Tech Review*. "Then I started to feel kind of betrayed... It definitely affected my trust in her." She added that she was "honestly really surprised and confused" because she thought her therapist was competent and could be trusted — and trust issues, ironically, were her onus for going into therapy in the first place. When she asked the therapist about the AI usage, she too owned up — and claimed that she'd used it because she had never had a dog before herself. As more and more people turn to so-called [AI therapists]() — which even OpenAI CEO [Sam Altman admits]() aren't equipped to do the job of a real-life professional due to [privacy risks]() and the technology's troubling [propensity to result in mental health breakdowns]() — the choice to see a flesh-and-flood mental health professional should be one that people feel confident in making. Instead, the therapists in these these anecdotes (and, presumably, plenty more where they came from) are risking their clients' trust and privacy — and perhaps their own careers, should they use a [non-HIPAA-complaint chatbot](), or if they don't disclose to patients that they're doing so. **More on AI and mental health:** [*Man Falls Into AI Psychosis, Kills His Mother and Himself*]() ## Author At Futurism, I've often been drawn to unpacking the narratives that underlie technological, scientific and medical progress, with a special interest in areas of conflict and ambiguity that end up setting agendas and steering the fates of both elites and the hoi polloi. I'm a committed generalist, but I often find myself returning to work involving NASA and the private space sector, the effects of AI on media and society, and the mechanics of the pharmaceutical industry, with a specific focus on the spread of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy. Prior to Futurism, I worked for publications ranging from Media Matters and Truthdig to Raw Story and Bustle. I'm also the author of "Myspace Scene Queens," a 2024 title in Instar Books' acclaimed "Remember the Internet" series. My work at Futurism has been cited by outlets including the New Yorker, Slate, Nieman Lab, the Verge, the MIT Technology Review, the Sunday Times, and the Daily Beast. I grew up in North Carolina, attended the University of North Carolina at Asheville, and now live in Brooklyn, New York. In my free time, I'm an avid reader and music fan; you can probably find me at a local poetry reading, concert, underground rave, or DJ set. I'm the proud parent of an ineffable orange cat named Mee-Mow. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()