Behind the Desk #1: When APP became a load I couldn't carry part-time

I started APP not just because I felt isolated as a new parent — but because postpartum care felt uncoordinated and inaccessible here. What I wanted was one trusted place of guidance, from both experts and fellow parents — so that's what APP became: structure for new families navigating this unique, transformative season of life.

Big mission, eh? So it's probably no surprise that…

I started to break down

It was on a trip to the US that I realized I wanted to shift to building Amsterdam Parent Project (APP) full-time. I was visiting my in-laws — a wonderful, suburban, "American Dream" setup in the Northeast, similar to the one I grew up in. Surrounded by the trappings of my childhood culture, I realized two things:

• First: My personal values had meaningfully diverged from my family and friends back "home"
• Second: I wasn't fully living by my values here in Amsterdam

When I decided to take a new job in tech last February, I was at the tail end of parental burnout leave and building the APP community from a place of healing. I told myself: I can do both. I can build enterprise software with good people in an interesting domain, and fill my community cup with hyper-local impact through APP. I've always mixed full-time work and volunteering — I used to serve on the board of SheSharp while working at Trello.

The difference this time around? I also had a growing toddler.

Working full-time and building APP on the side and parenting a 2 year old (and dog!) meant that my days looked like this:

In the US, being busy is a badge of honor. The more packed your schedule is, the more "successful" you look. Success should mean money, and money buys luxuries that make life fuller.

I left the US because the hustle mentality was burning me out. I carefully reintroduced work/life balance — not just time-wise, but emotionally, culturally — here in Amsterdam. Then I lost it again when my daughter was born: desperate to reprove my worth, and to show everyone that I could "bounce back" as a working mom, as productive as ever.

But my definition of "bouncing back" postpartum was somehow even more overextended than before. Here I was with three full-time jobs — tech, nonprofit, parenting — stretched to the limit and burning out again 🫠

It took standing back in the life I decided to leave behind in the US 6 years ago to remember that moving to Amsterdam was the best decision I ever made — for my health, my family, and how I want to contribute to society.

I gave notice somewhat out of the blue, and about a month later, I left the tech industry behind.

My community and tech halves, now as one whole

Faced with seemingly endless amounts of time, I felt the ideas flooding in from both experience and the community. Then I looked at APP's plate and panicked: the existing approach was built around my limited capacity, on me showing up, not scaling up. More time didn't mean more energy. What could/would/should APP look like if I actually gave myself room to breathe?

I realized that the value I brought to the family support space looked really different from my peers — different than a social club or a birthing class. It was the foundation underneath those. As a software engineer and product manager, I knew how to build infrastructure. As a builder for the community, I could do that in a way that wasn't mining data, chasing AI features to appease investors, or adding more mental load to already-overwhelmed parents.

I can build bespoke community software and systems solving small, local problems that new families in Amsterdam feel every day.

What has changed since April

Since leaving, I've been doing just that: building software and systems like:

• Groups Directory: Discover local parent communities. 100+ local parent groups, 550+ parents, all in one (secure) place
• Postpartum Post: Skip the group chat, get to the deep stuff. Meet parents nearby with kids your child's age — 1:1 and on your schedule.
• Fourth Trimester Program → First Year Program: No more waiting for or missing a cohort. Rolling membership so that everyone with a baby under 1 can access support when they need it.

We're finally entering the "sustain, not build" era, and I couldn't be more excited. Next time, I'll share how these seemingly unrelated initiatives tie together — and how Amsterdam's postpartum care ecosystem is starting to rise even from when I was in the thick of newborn parenthood 3 years ago.