24 builds, 5 App Store rejections, and what finally shipped

ThothMind was approved on 31 August. The numbers behind that sentence: 24 builds, 5 rejections, one crash that only happened on iPad in windowed mode, one Sign in with Apple button with the wrong style, and three separate rejections for the same subscription mistake.

The rejection I earned three times

App Store Connect treats the app version and the in-app purchases as separate objects. If you submit the version for review without attaching the subscription group and every subscription to the same review draft, the version goes alone and comes back with Guideline 2.1(b): "In-App Purchase products have not been submitted."

I read that message three times before I understood that it was not about the products themselves. They were configured, priced, and approved. They simply were not in the draft I sent. The fix is one checkbox on the version page, in the section most people scroll past.

The crash nobody could reproduce on a phone

The app is iPhone-only, but Apple reviews on iPad in windowed mode. In that mode, reading the device locale during the first render burst hit a native module before it was ready and the app died on launch. The fix was to read the locale lazily, after the first frame, and to build React Native from source so a patch to the TurboModule call could actually take effect.

The lesson is boring and worth stating: the review environment is not your test environment, and "iPhone-only" does not mean "never runs on iPad".

The wording Apple would not accept

The crisis flow originally described itself in a way that sounded like medical care. Apple asked for a real crisis line and clearer language. That was the right call. The session now shows a regional helpline (988 in the US and Canada, 183 and 112 in Türkiye, 112 across the EU, findahelpline.com elsewhere) before anything else, and the copy says what it is: three minutes of grounding, not treatment.

What the app is

Every breathing app I tried asked for my eyes. A ring expands, a number counts down, and I am supposed to concentrate on it while my chest is tight. That is backwards.

So the rhythm went into the haptic motor. You hold the phone, close your eyes, and feel when to breathe in and when to let go. Box breathing, 4-7-8, the physiological sigh, coherent breathing, each at its own pace.

The crisis session is free and will stay free. No account, no paywall. Nobody should hit a payment screen on their worst day.

What I would tell myself on build 1

• Put the subscription group in the review draft. Check it twice.
• Test the launch path on iPad windowed mode even if you ship iPhone-only.
• Write the crisis copy for the reviewer who has to defend it, not for the landing page.
• Count the builds. It keeps you honest about how much of "almost done" is left.

ThothMind is on the App Store for iPhone, iOS 16 and later, in English and Turkish.