Rapunzel

This fits more closely my view of Rapunzel from an awesome childrens' book I had as a kid with an older version of the story in it. Her secret boyfriend the prince has been visiting her every day for several months when she begins to have trouble fitting into her dresses and her adoptive mother, who kept her in the tower to protect her from the ways of men since she had come of age, realises she is pregnant and in a fit of rage banishes the young woman from the tower to survive on her own in the wilderness for her betrayal (and cuts off all the girl's hair). When the prince comes round later the witch lets down all the hair from the window and when the prince climbs up to find her at the top he lets go in shock and the fall to the ground blinds and cripples him. The prince finds a stick and stumbles blindly through the wilderness for a year, eating what berries and leaves he can find and sleeping on the ground. His wretched journeys end when he hears the singing of Rapunzel (which is what had first alerted him to the presence of a woman in the strange magical tower without doors) and she's been living the wilderness this whole time, taking care of their newborn kid(s) and doing just fine fending for herself and surviving. Her tears of joy are so full of love that they restore his sight when they embrace so he is able to see where he is and lead his new family back to his palace.
So while the prince was basically crawling around crying and starving for a year, Rapunzel was busy doing alright as a hardcore survivalist (after never leaving her room for several years) AND a mother. This woman was hardcore.