She was more interested in "the alternative", namely the theological drafts of early scholasticism and more in the Franciscan than the Dominican line.
She received her doctorate there in 1954 (at the same time as her fellow students Joseph Ratzinger and Uta Ranke-Heinemann).
[citation needed] She initially worked in Japan, first as a lecturer in medieval German literature at the ecclesiastical Sophia University in Tokyo, then as a lecturer in Christian philosophy at the Society of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (Japanese: Seishinkai) Seishin Women's University.
[citation needed] Her first attempt at habilitation failed in 1963 due to an objection from the German Bishops' Conference: Laity should not be made professors.
[citation needed] She was married to the literary scholar Wilhelm Gössmann from 1954 until his death in January 2019 and had two daughters and two grandchildren.