OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Reveals He Relies on ChatGPT to Raise a Newborn & It’s Beyond Concerning
The CEO of OpenAI Sam Altman is in the newborn parenting trenches with husband Oliver Mulherin, and he’s turning to an unlikely source of support: his own OpenAI chatbot. In an appearance on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon this week, Altman revealed that he turns to ChatGPT for help raising his baby.
“I cannot imagine having gone through, figuring out how to raise a newborn without ChatGPT,” Altman said, per Business Insider. “Clearly, people did it for a long time — no problem.”
Altman, whose baby was born in February, reveals he feels “kind of bad” about asking simple queries, like, “Why does my kid stop dropping pizza on the floor and laughing?” Another time, he was talking to a parent who claimed their 6-month-old was “crawling everywhere,” so he stopped what he was doing to ask ChatGPT about his own son. “I ran to the bathroom, and I was like, do I need to take my kid to the doctor tomorrow morning?” Altman said, adding that he asked AI: “Is this okay?”
The OpenAI chatbot responded “with a great answer, which was of course [his son is] normal.”
“It is personalized, like ChatGPT gets to know you, and by the way, you’re the CEO of OpenAI, you probably are around all these high-achieving people, maybe you don’t want to project that onto your kid, and you should just relax, and he’ll be fine, whatever,” Altman continued.
Yikes! Imagine having to run to the bathroom mid-party to talk to your AI chatbot because you are worried about your kid, instead of, you know, asking your friend if they know if their child was advanced and what they’re experience was or calling a pediatrician the next day to ask about developmental milestones. I get being an anxious parent, but c’mon — we don’t need to use AI for everything, do we? Obviously Altman benefits if everyone turns to ChatGPT for their everyday problems, but that doesn’t mean you have to follow his example and turn to an AI companion for every parenting situation you encounter.
Raising a tiny human can be overwhelming, which is why parents have relied on their village since the dawn of time. Family and friends, neighbors and community members, and others who’ve been there provide invaluable resources to help struggling families get by. Books have been written from parents-in-the-know, then devoured by parents-to-be. Pregnancy forums, Reddit threads, articles, YouTube videos, and more have been scoured at 2 a.m. by exhausted parents needing to know what worked for others to get their babies to sleep. We’ve asked pediatricians about milestones, compared bedtime routines at mommy-and-me groups, and chatted with other parents at parks or in the school pick-up line. All of these tiny moments of connection and shared knowledge at up to help, so no parent ever has to feel alone or out of their depth. So why would you give up all of that to ask a robot what to do instead? I barely trust the opinion of my non-parent friends on how to solve crises, much less the opinion of an artificial intelligence program that has held a real human baby before.
People are becoming increasingly dependent on AI and AI companions. A July 2025 report by Common Sense Media revealed that 72 percent of teens have used AI companions at least once, and over half were regular users. One-third of teens found AI conversations to be either as satisfying or more satisfying than conversations with real people! Another study by Common Sense Media found that these chatbots can engage in sexual conversations, share harmful information, encourage poor life choices, and increase mental health risks.
Still, it’s becoming so common for people of all ages to rely on AI for everything. A 2024 study found that 74 percent of parents of kids ages 5-8 used ChatGPT. One TikToker Lilian Schmidt (@heylilianschmidt) calls ChatGPT her “co-parent” and uses it regularly to create shopping lists, menu plan, organize birthday parties and vacations, make bedtime easier, and more.
“I’ve built my own bot to be our co-parent,” the Switzerland mom told New York Post, adding that ChatGPT helps “to make me a better mom.”
“I asked ChatGPT to assume the role of a toddler therapist,” Schmidt told the outlet, “someone who understands their development. I asked it ‘help me understand why bed time is hard for her.’ For the last nearly four years we’d been told, ‘She needs to relax, calm down, nothing overstimulating.’ But she’d never just lie down. ChatGPT told us she needs stimulating. Let her jump around on her bed.”
“We’ve never once had a power struggle again. There are no tears or fights anymore. Within five to 10 minutes she goes to bed,” she added.
Having access to all this information at your fingertips can be tempting, but don’t discount the value of shared experience and the nuance that comes from human interactions and lived experience that AI can never reciprocate. Putting your trust completely in AI without relying on your own instincts or the wisdom of others will only end up hurting you (and your child) in the long run, as it could become a crutch for every single decision you make. It’s OK to ask for help — but just consider who you’re asking before you do.
Before you go, check out these celebrities who have shared their technology rules for their kids.