If you are using ChatGPT or Claude for your divorce, stop and read this, because a court changed the rules.
In February 2026, a federal court ruled that your conversations with AI tools are not protected the way conversations with your lawyer are. There is no privilege. What you type to an AI is, legally, closer to a text message than to a confidential consultation. That means your chat logs can potentially be subpoenaed and read in open court, the same way texts and emails are read in open court every single day in family law.
I want to be clear about where I stand, because I am not here to scare you away from these tools. I used AI through my entire divorce and it saved me somewhere around $30,000. I used it to audit my lawyer's bills, where I found $3,350 in charges that should not have been there. I used it to analyze settlement offers against state guidelines. I used it to catch provisions missing from my decree and errors in the judge's own ruling. AI is the most powerful tool a divorcing person has ever had. That is exactly why you have to use it like an adult.
So here are the rules I followed, and the ones I put in every book I have written since.
First, never type anything you would not want read aloud in open court, because that is now a possibility you have to plan for. Ask how to organize your finances. Do not vent fantasies about your ex.
Second, never ask anything shady, even as a joke. A joke in a chat log does not look like a joke on a projector screen in a courtroom.
Third, keep identities out of it. Your name, your ex's name, your kids' names, your account numbers, your employer. Ask your questions in general terms. The advice comes back just as good, and the log stays clean.
Fourth, treat every AI answer as a draft, not a verdict. AI makes mistakes. Verify everything against primary sources, and run anything important past a licensed professional before you act on it.
Fifth, remember what the tool is for. AI is for preparation: organizing, calculating, drafting, checking. Decisions stay human. Yours.
Used carelessly, AI becomes evidence. Used systematically, with the rules above, it levels a playing field that has been tilted against regular people for two hundred years. The complete safe use system, and the seventy plus prompts I actually used, are in The Divorce Bible and The Divorce AI Toolkit.
Use the tool. Respect the record.