But the experience of being migrants, and sometimes refugees, forced them to examine their lives and to adopt both social and economic roles which would have been rejected at home. This remaking of self was often a traumatic experience that was complicated by the necessity of adjustment in their relationships with husbands, sons, brothers. In this sense, migrant women are seen as 'adjusting better,' needing less outside help. Women also have to do without the moral and other support of parents, grandparents and extended family. In spite of this, and because of this, women have been the leaders who have held families and communities together in times of crisis.
Women are usually the leaders at the local community level.
In Australian Non-Government Organisations there are skilled women fighting for the most important issues faced by their communities. And yet, as power moves up the ladder from the local community to national and international policy making, women's voices and women themselves, tend to disappear. This is true also of migrant women in other countries, such as Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and so on. From this point, indigenous, immigrant and refugee women's experiences are marked by silences, absences, exclusion from the 'mainstream' of resources. They grit their teeth and get on with the work.