How do you deal with low launch numbers without giving up?

After launching, my project received only three upvotes, and two were from family. The anxiety of refreshing the browser every few minutes hoping for validation is something I won't forget.

The silence was humiliating for days. But then, an active user reached out to let me know my tool solved a massive headache in their daily workflow. That message proved to be worth way more than a hundred upvotes on a leaderboard.

I constantly remind myself that a launch day doesn't define the life of a product. Still, self-motivation is a constant struggle, and often I sit down to build purely out of persistence rather than passion.

How do you push through when the launch response is far below your expectations?