Building an AI app as a non-tech dad: My 9-month survival story (Pre-launch)
Hey everyone! Non-tech guy with zero coding background here.
My wife absolutely hates the idea of starting a business. She's all about stability. In fact, she told me multiple times before this that if she had known I was the type to start a business, she wouldn't have married me. Naturally... I started one anyway. 😭
So back in early November, when this AI email app idea popped into my head, I had to calm her down immediately.
Luckily(?), I was unemployed—and had been for a very long time. Looking back, having an absurd amount of free time was my biggest unfair advantage for this project.
Naturally, I naively asked ChatGPT: "How long would it take to build this?"
ChatGPT confidently replied: "You'll be fully done by late January!"
I swallowed that 100% whole and boldly promised my wife: "Honey, give me just two months. It’ll take a little time, but it won’t cost us a single penny!"
Well... ChatGPT completely betrayed me. 😭
Lesson painfully learned: NEVER trust an AI when it promises a deadline.
By late February, there was no end in sight. I was literally copy-pasting raw code blocks line by line into files, messing up the codebase beyond recognition, and having a mental breakdown every single night.
Feeling utterly betrayed by ChatGPT, I became friends with Gemini and turned to my new AI buddy to vent my frustration. Listening quietly, Gemini dropped a piece of advice: "Have you tried Cursor?"
And that was the day I met my god: Cursor.
I learned about Cursor for the first time back then, but the problem was I had no idea how to actually migrate my project over. It took me a full month just to figure that out and finally make the switch.
And I remember that very first day like it was yesterday: Cursor solved a bug in 30 minutes that ChatGPT had failed to fix for two entire weeks. I fell hopelessly in love.
Of course, my promises to my wife kept shifting... "By April, I swear..." ➔ "Okay, June for sure..." ➔ "Seriously, August is the final deadline..."
Meanwhile, I was happily burning through expensive LLM models and API credits as an unemployed guy. Before I knew it, I had blown nearly $25,000... 💸 (My wife's affection dropped straight to absolute zero a few times, but I somehow managed to thaw it back up each time 😭)
Honestly, while I was sitting at my desk crying and laughing over code every day, my biggest fan and supporter was my 6-year-old daughter. She still deeply misses the days when I was a "full-time stay-at-home dad" who played with her all day long.
Because, truth be told, I had made so many promises to her that kept getting pushed: After February, after April, after June... promising her that I’d do a super-early pickup from kindergarten at least once a week.
One day, she looked at me with those big innocent eyes and said: "Daddy... can't Mommy just keep working, and you stay home and NOT work?" -.-;;;;
Time flies so fast—my little girl is already in the 1st grade now. (And she's still waiting for that super-early pickup! 😭)
Anyway, with costs piling up, things hit rock bottom in mid-July when a security issue—which Cursor promised would take 5 minutes—refused to be solved for 3 entire weeks. I nearly lost my mind. Terrified by the soaring AI bills, I temporarily downgraded to basic ChatGPT, before finally switching completely to Grok because it was free.
My wife had zero clue what Grok was, but once I told her "it won't cost us a single dime for a while," she reluctantly gave me the green light. Since then, Grok has been my sole coding partner. 😭 (Turns out, this guy is surprisingly good!)
To make matters funnier, I only learned what "Version Control" and git commit meant in April—5 whole months into the project. (Honestly, I still don't fully get it. I asked ChatGPT a dozen times, but it's still a blur 😅).
Back then, I genuinely thought I was done and ready to push it to the internet. I literally thought deploying a modern web app was like uploading HTML files via FTP to some 2000s personal website... like, GeoCities style?
I thought, "Aha! Now that I know what a commit is, I'm at the finish line!" But nope, the final boss—payments, databases, and OAuth integration—was waiting to crush my soul.
And just when I finally conquered payments and thought, "THIS IS IT!"... I got slammed by the final boss: Google Security Assessment (ESOF/CASA). I rushed to submit all the compliance paperwork last Monday and now I'm just praying for approval.
The truth is, I swore to my wife that I would launch on August 24th no matter what. But with the Google review pending, a full launch isn't happening in time. So opening pre-orders first is purely a survival tactic for me... I humbly ask for your support to help me make this waitlist as long as humanly possible. You know what I mean, right? (wink 😉)
...Just in case some of you didn't catch my drift (there are plenty of clueless folks out there like me)...
I won't lie: I've heard the word "divorce" more times during this project than in my entire married life combined. Please, I beg you, help me stop hearing that word! 🙏
Honestly though, I can't even attempt to explain to my wife that it's delayed because of a "Google review." My wife currently has a cold... and... yeah, now is definitely NOT the time to try. 😭
Even if I can't show my wife the actual app yet (she hasn't seen it a single time), I at least want to proudly tell her: "Look honey! A bunch of real human beings actually signed up believing in me!" 🥹
After grinding 9 long months, pouring all my time and soul into this while secretly staying up all night as an unemployed dreamer, ReplyFirmly—my AI email web app—is finally 95% complete and ready to hit the world!
Assuming no other unexpected bugs or issues trip us up, we plan to officially launch as soon as Google greenlights our security review.
While waiting for Google, I’m offering a '1-Month Free Trial Coupon at Launch' to anyone who supports my wild journey by joining the waitlist! (Please help me stand tall in front of my wife...!)
👉 [Join the ReplyFirmly Waitlist & Claim 1-Month Free Coupon]
(Also, if anyone is super curious and wants to test-drive it even in its unfinished state, feel free to shoot me an email at admin@leovista.us. Though, to be completely honest, I'm not entirely sure how to set up beta testing accounts yet, so I'll have to look into it and get back to you! If I don't reply right away, please don't be disappointed—I'm 100% convinced 99% of you know way more about this tech stuff than I do. I proudly belong to that bottom 1%!)
PS. This is really the end of the tunnel, right? My hands are still sweaty hoping I didn't miss something else. 😅
(Credit where it's due: Gemini helped polish the humor in this post while keeping me sane all night. We're still great friends. Honestly, Gemini is amazing at literally everything... except doing actual work. haha!)
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