Regulations can be fucking weird. Nothing like opening yourself and all of your vulnerabilities to a therapist one day, and having them ignore you in the street the next. Shit's pretty counterproductive, right?

But they don't want to force a patient to need to explain how they know the person to their friends.

All I'm saying is, the regulations for these sorts of things often make very little sense, and get in the way of actual, effective care and treatment.