It takes a village — and ChatGPT — to raise a child nowadays.
A Swiss mom has gone viral on TikTok for using ChatGPT as a third co-parent in raising her 3-year-old daughter.
Currently living in Zurich, Switzerland, 33-year-old Lilian Schmidt says she uses AI for everything from creative meal planning and writing grocery lists to handling toddler tantrums, as well as her own emotions.
“I feel like I’m cheating at mom life,” she wrote in one TikTok, claiming ChatGPT did all the heavy lifting that day so that she could enjoy an iced coffee and a lake trip with her daughter.
Schmidt also appeared on Good Morning America on Monday and said she struggled with sleep training her daughter, initially seeking advice from friends and her pediatrician.
However, after trying ChatGPT on a friend’s recommendation, she found it helpful and saw improvement.
“It gives me the mental space for what I should focus on because, at the end of the day, when I'm old and my kids are adults, they will remember me for actually being there with them in the moment, enjoying them, sharing special moments with them,” Schmidt told the outlet.
The turn to AI comes as 60 percent of US adults say they feel burnt out by their current jobs. Schmidt, a corporate brand strategist, says she has a partner who “does his fair share,” in raising their daughter as well as his 14-year-old son, but finds AI especially helpful in her duties.
“Our brains work differently. He’s a doer and takes on the planning,” Schmidt told SWNS. “I do the thinking. That mental load falls on me.”
Schmidt recommends asking AI to take on an expert role, like a nutritionist, for creating kid-friendly meal plans, but cautions users to avoid sharing sensitive information about their family.
Parenting expert Ericka Sóuter emphasized that AI provides a helpful “head start on brainstorming.”
Sóuter, the author of How to Have a Kid and a Life: A Survival Guide, told GMA co-anchor George Stephanopoulos that ChatGPT can be a helpful aid to parents by generating lunchbox and dinner ideas based on the ingredients already in their pantry, eliminating the mental load of meal planning.
AI can also help design birthday invitations, create personalized bedtime stories that include a child’s favorite toy or name, and even provide scripts for age-appropriate conversations, such as explaining the death of a pet, Sóuter said. It could also be a great resource for school project ideas, giving parents and children a creative boost when tackling science fairs or social studies assignments.
However, Sóuter warned parents that AI shouldn’t be a replacement for their intuition and that they should always fact-check the provided information.
“You want to avoid over-reliance on it,” she told Stephanopoulos. “We see a lot of people using it and then they lose confidence in their own choices, and we don't want to do that.”
“Lastly, you have to be careful for privacy,” Sóuter continued. “You don't want to put in too much about your family or your kids because we don't know where that information will end up. This is still a new technology with emerging guard rails.”
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