Support When Crashing Out at 3:17 AM
More clients are showing up to session having already talked something through with an AI tool the night before. That's not a red flag. It's a shift in how people process, and the clinicians who understand it will serve their clients better than the ones who treat it as competition. The real question isn't whether AI belongs anywhere near therapy. It's what job we let it do, and what job stays firmly human.
I Had Doubts
I'll admit I didn't start here. As a consumer using various AI chatbots, and as an educator running online courses during this same stretch of time, I was initially quite anti-AI, and I've watched some of my early instincts get confirmed. I've seen language itself shift, students suddenly writing “ensure”, “crucial,” and “critical,” all crammed into a single paragraph, in a way no one actually talked before these tools existed. I've also watched a chatbot confidently tell one of my students that there's a blood test for a certain kind of psychological condition, which simply wasn’t true. That combination, flattened language and outright fabrication, is exactly why I don't think this technology gets a free pass in a therapeutic context.
Where AI Actually Helps
Used well, AI can function as a between-session skills coach. It's available at 3:17 AM when a distress spike hits, and no therapist is on call. It can walk someone through a Distress Tolerance skill, prompt a pause before an impulsive text, or help a client put language to a feeling in the moment it's happening, which is itself a core part of the therapeutic process.
Where It Runs Out of Road
What AI cannot do is hold a treatment history. It's never experienced anything we talk to it about, not loss, not fear, not joy, so at best it functions like an interactive workbook, the same way a psychotherapy worksheet has always been a fine thing to have between sessions, but nobody mistakes the worksheet for the therapist. It reflects language back. It does not know you, and it never will.
The Line to Hold
If a tool is helping someone practice a skill they already know they need, it's doing its job. If it's starting to replace the human relationship that skill was meant to protect, that's the moment to close the laptop and reach out to a real person. The workbook comparison works both ways too. If you'd rather skip the screen entirely, a low-tech, analog worksheet does the same job between sessions. You'll find a few at the top of this page under the Workbooks tab. If you're navigating anxiety, burnout, or relationship strain and want to figure out where AI fits, or doesn't, in your own support system, I'd welcome the conversation. You can book a consultation with me directly using the form below.