Educated as a teacher, she spent a year in France, where her exposure to the life of prostitutes and single mothers affected her profoundly.

[4][5] In collaboration with her brother-in-law Johan Castberg, she worked tirelessly to legislate the rights of children born out of wedlock.

[6] She then turned her attention to decriminalizing abortion in Norway, an idea she presented through a lecture called "the liberation of motherhood", with the subtitle "the production of children under culture, the woman's right to decide over her own body".

In spite of opposition from opinion leaders such as Sigrid Undset, she managed to establish the first "hygiene office" in Oslo to inform women on contraception.

She served as a member of the organization, together with fellow rights activists Karen Grude Koht, Fredrikke Marie Qvam, Gina Krog, and Betzy Kjelsberg.