Ask HN: Women who've applied to YC?

I'm female. I started an application at some point, mostly for the process involved in thinking things through, and contemplated whether or not I thought applying would be realistic. I ultimately decided, no, that's not really the right path for me. But I hang out here a fair amount.

(I made a wish list at some point and one of the items on it was something like "Get feedback from Paul Graham" (another was "get feedback from Millard Fuller", er, who happens to be dead it turns out). Decided I didn't need any special favors, I could just keep reading pg's articles and also hang here. So far, so good. Still don't have any answers for the impetus behind the Millard Fuller wish. Que sera, sera.)

I still hope to figure out how to support myself via some kind of online income. I am 45, a lot older than most of the YC applicants as I understand it, I have a very serious medical condition and two grown sons who still live with me. I have lived in the SFBA previously, in Fairfield about 45 miles from San Francisco (halfway between SF and the state capital). My sons are very against returning to Cali. I liked it but I have my reservations. I think I need to go someplace that meets my health needs. Keeping myself (and my sons) well is my highest priority and it is very clear in my mind that this is the single most important criteria for me ever having any kind of financial success.

I have figured out how to get myself (and my oldest son, who has the same diagnosis) well when doctors and most of the world believe it cannot be done. I joined HN to ask how to quickly learn a programming language. I did this more than a year ago, shortly after I got off the last of my medication and finally had a clear head for the first time in many years, but I still have not learned the first thing about a programming language. The reason for the request for info on a programming language: I have concluded that I need a more information dense means to convey what I know. The written word on my website is just not cutting it. Only people who aren't already deeply rooted in current views of the problem seem able to use it at all. Everyone else is openly hostile. I think a simulation (aka game) could potentially solve the problem. But I still do not know a programming language and I am still working full time and still have a significant time burden in terms of continuing to get well. I have never met a single person who was as sick as I was and came back the way I have. So I have zero yardstick for judging how long this "should" take. I will get there when I get there, thus I am in no position to make promises to outsiders in terms of deliverable timeframes.

I also waffle a lot between this idea and other interests. The massive open hostility I have gotten for trying to help people doesn't go over terribly well with me. I often wonder if I should bother to try to solve this issue or if I should go off and try to live the "normal life" I always wanted now that I am nearly well enough to do something like that.

Not me. Co-founder (3-person team) is @mediamum who is doing a PhD as a Research Assistant at the School of Computer Science at CU (alum include David Morin from Facebook and Woz). She's doing research into the use of social media for crisis communications (hurricanes, wildfires etc) in the Crisis Informatics Lab there. Doesn't hang out on HN so much (must be startup and PhD getting in the way).

Interestingly, Woz got kicked out of the CS school at CU for hacking side projects on the timeshare system as an undergrad - something other schools might have encouraged, and which CU today I am guessing would also not frown on the same way.

May I ask why you're hiding your gender on HN? I know of many potential reasons, just curious what yours is.