I built an AI assistant for new moms after our newborn's jaundice was almost missed. Here's the story and the stack
At 3am, four days into my son's life, he wasn't feeding well and had stopped making wet diapers. We'd been up for three nights straight and couldn't tell if this was normal newborn stuff or something wrong.
We asked ChatGPT. It flagged the pattern as likely jaundice and told us to get him checked. We did, and his bilirubin was high enough that he needed phototherapy. He's fine now, but the moment stuck with me. So much depended on us remembering to ask the right question, to an assistant with no memory of our baby and no way to check in on us first.
That gap is why I built Hey Susan, with my co-founder (and wife) Joanna.
She's not another logging app. She runs on nine faculties, modeled loosely on how memory and attention work in the brain, so instead of just recording what you tell her, she notices. Text her "fed 4oz at 9am" in plain English and she remembers it, watches the pattern over time, and reaches out first when something drifts.
She's an AI assistant, not a medical device. She notices patterns, she doesn't diagnose, and every nudge points back to your pediatrician. There's a hard-coded safety floor underneath too: a short list of true emergency phrasings routes straight to "call your doctor now," no model involved.
Native iOS and Android, both just submitted for App Store/Play Store review. Free in private beta, with $14.99/mo or $99/yr planned once we open up more broadly.
Genuinely curious what this community thinks of "assistant, not companion" as a positioning bet. I think the warmth has to live in the product, not the marketing, but I could be wrong.
Still more features to come. As our baby grows we'll run into more challenges, and I hope this app can help us and other families too.
Warren
