React Native Send Remote Push Notifications Outside of Expo Go (IOS)

I have been in a loop trying to find a way to send push notifications in React Native using Expo, but being allowed to send it without having Expo Go downloaded on my phone.

Currently, I am using native-noify and I register it upon launch registerIndieID(user.attributes.email, 38XX, 'GCvuXXXXXX');

Then, I have my own Lambda function that does an Axios call to trigger the push notification:

await axios.post(`https://app.nativenotify.com/api/indie/notification`, {
              subID: item.UserID,
              appId: 3XXX8,
              appToken: 'GCvuXXXXc',
              title: 'Gym Time!',
              message: `Today is your ${item[today]} day! Go get em!`
        }).then(res => {
          console.log('results', res)
        }).catch(err => {
          console.log("failed to send notification: ", err)
        });

This sends a notification when i have Expo Go installed, and the notification comes through Expo Go.

I need it to be independent of Expo Go. I am open to alternative libraries, like notifee, but I need to be able to trigger the notification via my own lambda function -- the notification also needs to be individual to each person, so not a blast message.