In August 1862, the 17-year-old girl felt a special call to religious life, but her parents openly hindered her. For four years, her father's "no" was categorical. Then he finally allows her to take her vows. Some insight into how the knot of paternal consent was untied comes to us from the testimony of Sr. Johanna Ankenbrand:

​

“I know nothing special about the origin and the first development of the religious vocation, nor about the way in which it was carried out by asking the Confessor for advice, or making special prayers--they are intimate things and the Servant of God spoke of herself very rarely. I know that her father would have preferred her to have a status in the world and her mother was preparing her to become a good family leader, but she did not indulge in such parental aspirations, although she never disrespected them. I learned from Sister Hedwig, as well as from Sister Scholastica, that one day a jurist came to the house with the intention of asking for the hand of the Servant of God, probably in agreement with the father. The Servant of God, out of delecate feeling towards her  parents, who would have been displeased with a refusal, hid herself in the attic and did not show herself until after the jurist had left. This persuaded the parents of their daughter's vocation”.
 

(From the testimonies of the Ordinary process of Nepi

on the heroicity of the virtues of Mother Francesca Streitel, 1937-1940)