Asian Women's resilience to Adversity

I recently met up with my school friends in Klang. We usually catch up once every quarter since we started to meet up after 20 years of missing each other. I must have caught one of my girlfriends in one of her frustrating mood that she opened up to me. She told me how her husband has not been working for past 8 years. And even if he does, it doesn't last, the most, maybe a year.
Let's call my girlfriend "Cathy". I remember during my secondary school days, (maybe we were then about 15), I always envied Cathy, she has great parent, smart siblings. Her sisters all studied overseas, one of them in London and I always assume she would follow her sister’s footsteps after leaving school. But she didn’t, instead she married one of her childhood school friend, a year or two after leaving school. Marriage was great in those years, although they weren’t well off but comfortable. Cathy instead becomes a housewife when the kids came in and she was happy to do so.
Due to the recession in the late 90s, her husband decides to leave to overseas to work for more income. However, the weather condition of the country didn’t suit him and he soon came back. And that’s when he changed. And since then Cathy has to work in a restaurant to support the whole family of 3 boys plus her non-working husband. She learnt to bake cookies to sell during festivals, just to make some extra income. Baking for days to early wee mornings for each festival, just for RM3,000 net profit. 2 boys are in college now, taking loans to study and another still in school. When driving home, I can’t help but reflect our younger days when we were all so young, happy, not knowing how our lives will turn out. Some of us have big dreams, and some bigger dreams. But did our dreams come true; did our lives now, after 30 years, turns out the way we dreamt off in our younger days?
What Cathy said to me was what can she do, she has been a housewife since she married, and her kids need her. And I admire her for her strengths, her sacrifices for her kids. And I think back to those days when I always thought she would be leaving to study overseas, be a professional woman. Life is Certainly Uncertain!