Women in the GDR were by law equal to men. They had full autonomy (at least as full as it gets in a dictatorship), meanwhile in West Germany, husbands still could decide over their wives jobs until the 68 movement. The employment rate of women in the GDR was 90% in 1990, nowadays it’s 75%. The GDR allowed abortion within 12 weeks of pregnancy, this was abolished at reunification but Germany legalized abortion with the same timeframe in 1995. Kindergarten was free in Eastern Germany, the only payments were for meals. This was also abolished at reunification but still hasn’t been reintroduced.

One example is women didn't need to stay home the whole day for child care, since there was Kindergarten for everyone from age 3 to primary school and even nurseries for children between 6 months to age 3 if you wanted to. Nowadays in eastern Germany the care infrastructure is still there mostly, but not on sufficient numbers and it is not guaranteed anymore, so parents need to have enough money.

To be fair, that was not (only) out of good will, but also out of economical necessity, since the female workforce was as much needed as the male one to keep the whole thing going.