Mommy RefuelA little more room for you.
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AUTHOR · FOUNDER OF MOMMY REFUEL

Serhii Rohachov

24 articles

Product designer and engineer from Kyiv who designed and built Mommy Refuel end to end. CTO at Kyiv Academy of Media Arts, founder of seven a.m. He writes every product update here: what shipped, where and when.

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Onboarding screen asking “Where are you right now?” with options for pregnant, postpartum, planning, or supporting someone.

Why I'm launching this blog, from day one of Mommy Refuel

I'm starting a blog on mommyrefuel.com — real articles on motherhood and wellbeing, and this changelog written in my own name, in English and Ukrainian, alongside sharing Mommy Refuel more widely this week.

Serhii Rohachov
A mother holding her young child close at home

Privacy by design: what Mommy Refuel does with your data

I designed and built Mommy Refuel end to end, and the hardest constraint I set for myself wasn't a feature — it was what the app is not allowed to do with your data. Here is the honest version.

Serhii Rohachov
Parents sharing a kiss while carrying their children on a sunny path

Safety before features: why Mommy Refuel isn't a medical app

The riskiest thing I could do while building Mommy Refuel wasn't shipping too slowly — it was shipping a feature that sounds medical without being clinically reviewed. Here is how I built around that risk instead of hoping it wouldn't happen.

Serhii Rohachov
Refuel AI screen with suggested prompts like “Why is my score lower today?” and “Help me prepare for my doctor.”

Just talk: speak or type, and Mommy Refuel sorts it out

No forms, no menus — just speak or type about your day, and Mommy Refuel proposes where it belongs. You decide what actually gets saved. Here's exactly how it works and why I built it this way.

Serhii Rohachov
You've checked in today confirmation screen with a green checkmark and a Check in again button.

September 20: fixing a real language bug, builds 23-24

One bug on September 20 bothered me more than most: switching languages could leave half your screen in the old one. Here's what caused it, how I fixed it, and what else shipped that day.

Serhii Rohachov
Life Timeline Trends tab with a Refuel Score line chart from Aug 10 to Aug 31, showing 9 recorded days and 20 days with no data.

September 19 evening: Life Timeline graduates to a real pilot

After the morning's shipping, I spent the evening on something less flashy but more important: making sure the roadmap inside the app never tells you a working feature is still just an idea.

Serhii Rohachov
New journal note editor with a written entry, a dictate option, and mood tags like Grateful, Proud, Calm, Tired and Overwhelmed.

September 19 morning: Memories, Supplies, Expenses go live

Between 07:46 and 11:35 on September 19, six features moved from roadmap promises to things you can actually use — plus a weight-tracking step, a due-date step, and the first Apple Watch app.

Serhii Rohachov
Check-in screen with Mood options from Heavy to Bright and Energy options from Fuelled to Empty, all in English.

Fixing language switching for real, plus a dark-rose dark mode

Two days after adding six new languages, I found the switch itself didn't reliably work. Here's the honest story of fixing it properly, plus a new warm dark mode, across builds 15 to 17.

Serhii Rohachov
Language picker screen listing System, English, Ukrainian, Spanish, German, French, Polish, Italian, Portuguese and Russian.

Build 13: calmer design, Supplies & Expenses, six more languages

The busiest single day the app has had: a calmer redesign across every screen, two brand-new beta tools for family logistics, the app speaking six more languages, and build 13 prepared for TestFlight.

Serhii Rohachov
Ukrainian-language Today screen reading “Доброго вечора” with a Refuel Score of 60 and Ukrainian small steps for today.

The Mommy Refuel website becomes a real, 9-language site

In one working day, mommyrefuel.com went from a single scrolling landing page to a real multi-page site with a proper menu, matching editorial design, and content in nine languages. Here is exactly what changed, and when.

Serhii Rohachov
Current Today screen showing a Refuel Score of 60, sleep, energy and mood tiles, and a one-line note on what helps today.

Launch day, part 3: the daily loop gets real

Launch morning was the easy part to summarize. What followed that afternoon and evening was a long, dense run of shipping — Today, Care, Timeline, Partner mode, Memories, Children, and a dozen smaller honest fixes. Here's the full list.

Serhii Rohachov
Care handoff form with fields for baby's name, age, feeding, sleep and naps, allergies and care, what soothes them, and reach-me contact.

What's next, and Mommy Refuel Care Network

A few hours after going live on the App Store, I shipped two more things the same day: an honest "what's next" layer, and a new Care Network for finding real support — still behind a beta gate.

Serhii Rohachov
App Store marketing screenshot with the headline “A gentle place to begin” over the Today screen, subtitled “Support built around care, not engagement.”

Mommy Refuel is live on the App Store, free pilot

This morning Mommy Refuel stopped being a beta and became a real, downloadable app. Here is exactly what shipped, in what order, and why — from the person who built it.

Serhii Rohachov
Before you use Refuel AI consent screen explaining what is sent, who receives it (Anthropic's Claude), and what is never sent, with an Allow and continue button.

App Store review, round two: what Apple asked, what I changed

Build 11 came back from App Review with two real, fair findings. I'll walk through exactly what Apple flagged, what I changed in response, and why I bumped the version to 2.0.0 for the resubmission.

Serhii Rohachov
Settings screen showing Privacy & data, Export my data, and Delete account & data rows under a Privacy & Account section.

GA readiness day: privacy fixes, DNS cutover, honest release docs

September 5 was the least glamorous, most important day of the project so far: I found and closed three real privacy gaps, moved the site's DNS to AWS, and wrote down exactly what's still blocking a public launch.

Serhii Rohachov
Current Today screen scrolled to show Journal, Care & nannies, Recovery, Memories, Your timeline and Your week cards.

Mommy Refuel site v4: rebuilding it as a real product site

On September 4 I threw out the old marketing shell and rebuilt the site from zero: real iPhone screens instead of mockups, a full English/Ukrainian site, and the first pieces of the move to AWS.

Serhii Rohachov
Today screen scrolled down showing gentle stretches, a mood check prompt, a 9-day Refuel Score trend chart, and Journal, Care & nannies, and Your week cards.

Rebuilding mommyrefuel.com twice, and our first internal dashboard

The site went from a single landing page to a real multi-page product site, twice over, in one day — plus a broken logo fixed live, a move to AWS, and the first internal tool for running the company honestly.

Serhii Rohachov
Life Timeline screen in timeline view showing Check-in and Refuel Score entries grouped by date, with Table, Trends and Connections tabs.

Life Timeline, a family foundation, and App Store build 11

The day the app quietly grew a family and a memory: a private family foundation, a flag-gated Life Timeline, a calmer onboarding, and the App Store review round that followed.

Serhii Rohachov
App Store marketing screenshot with the headline “A private assistant, on your side” over the Refuel AI screen.

Mommy Refuel's AI moves to AWS, and a production-readiness audit

One long day: the Refuel AI assistant got a permanent home on AWS, I audited the whole authentication and safety chain end to end, and two TestFlight builds shipped.

Serhii Rohachov
App Store marketing screenshot with the headline “Your data. Your control.” over the Privacy & data screen.

Support, privacy links, and Mommy Refuel's first merged backend

The week the app stopped being a local prototype: real support and privacy pages, a cloud sync backend, and the first pull request merged into Mommy Refuel's main branch.

Serhii Rohachov
App Store marketing screenshot with the headline “Recover safely, never guess” over the empty Recovery screen.

v1.6: TestFlight readiness, and the site catches up

Over two days, 18–19 August 2026, the work shifted from adding features to getting genuinely ready: a clinical safety review package, beta diagnostics, privacy-safe metrics, a paid developer account migration — and mommyrefuel.com rebuilt to describe the real, built app instead of a pre-launch idea.

Serhii Rohachov
Prepare for appointment screen with a 7/14/30-day time window and toggles for Refuel Score trend, mood, sleep, and recovery notes.

v1.3–v1.5: Doctor mode, App Intents, HealthKit, Watch

In the second half of the same long day, 17 August 2026, Mommy Refuel gained a real explanation of its own score, Siri and Shortcuts support, a Doctor Visit Mode, and genuine Apple Watch, widget, HealthKit and Live Activity integrations — then a hardening pass to make sure none of it was fragile.

Serhii Rohachov
Refuel AI screen with suggested prompts like “Why is my score lower today?” and “Help me ask for help.”

v1.1 & v1.2: Refuel AI, private Journal, Care Circle, timeline

In a single day — 17 August 2026 — Mommy Refuel went from a bare prototype to a genuinely useful companion: Refuel AI, a private Journal, Care handoff, a nanny-search scaffold, weekly reports, Care Circle, a Privacy Center, evening reflection, a maternal timeline, and full Ukrainian.

Serhii Rohachov
Early Mommy Refuel welcome screen reading “Motherhood takes energy. We help you refuel.” with a Get started button.

Day one: why I started building Mommy Refuel

On 13 August 2026 I pushed the first commit of Mommy Refuel: an iOS app prototype, a landing page, a coming-soon site and a survey. Here is what that first push actually contained, and why I'm building this at all.

Serhii Rohachov
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