Ask HN: Stressed by Cofounders
I'm in some kind of personal hell and I have no idea what to do anymore.

About 4 months ago I was approached by an angel investor to found a software startup based on some work I had done for his friend. I've been helping said friend on his projects for over a year for little to no pay because I liked his ideas and wanted to support him in some way, as well as potentially find some opportunities.

Well it seemed that an opportunity had arisen, and I've been trying to start my own business for a little while with rapidly dwindling finances. So, I agreed to an arrangement of a three-way split (including the friend as idea guy) if they could give me some "breathing room" to work on a pitch demo/MVP for a few months. They said that they wouldn't have too much time to dedicate to the project but that they trusted me and they'd try to support me however they could. We agreed and all was good.

Over the few months that I'd been building the project, I'd been sending frequent updates and deployments for them to check out and give feedback on. Most of the time they'd quickly look at it, say "this is good", maybe have an idea or two, then disappear. I had a lot of questions that went unanswered, and the feedback I did get was mostly me trying to judge whether they actually liked it by gauging their enthusiasm. I decided it wasn't good enough and went back to the drawing board a few times, but each time I came back with an update it'd be the same reaction. It felt like they never got serious about the project, and I still think maybe it's because it's not that good.

The stress of not knowing if they're really on board, knowing I'm running out of money, and yet having a project that I think would be useful for people (and make us all money) if given enough love, really started getting to me.

So, I got frustrated and tried to manage the team. I asked everyone if they were willing to adopt certain roles on the project that could help me, maintain a Google doc for async discussion, and be available for a meeting once a week. I was a bit flustered so I didn't do it quite so succinctly and was very wordy with everything, and I managed to get the ideas guy to flip out at me - where he told me he thought he was contributing just fine, that he wouldn't be willing to do anything else, and that he told me that he wouldn't have much time to dedicate to the project at the start.

We hashed it out a bit, and he said that I should just call him if I have anything to talk about for the project. I agreed to, because I kind of wanted to end on a good note - but I honestly can't think of a reason to call him for anything at this point, considering he doesn't know much about the project and he's never given an indication of what he could even help me with.

Since then, I've delivered a version of the app that I think could work as a pitch demo. They both looked at it, said it's great and that they agreed it would work. I asked for a meeting to properly go over the features and talk about next steps, they both agreed then disappeared.

Now I'm sitting here waiting for them to get back to me, so that I can find out whether this project is going to continue at all, and whether they'll support me with a cash injection for the next couple of months as we start doing the business side, polishing the app, and pitching it to investors.

The way it feels, I depend on them to survive right now. We have a good project that could make me stop needing to depend on them, and would even let me pay them back. But, I don't know if it'll ever get there, I'm already dreading having to ask for more money, and if they decide not to give me any cash I might end up having to beg my parents for help because I can only survive like this for another month, max.

Does anyone have some ideas of what I can do here? I'm not sure how much of this situation is my fault.