 After completing high school in Tórshavn, Petersen passed the entrance exam in 1958 to study at Bagsværd Boarding School and High School in Denmark.Her father advised her against pursuing a career in journalism, and she started as a sales assistant in a dry good store.In 1959 she started studying at Copenhagen Business School, but then broke off her studies and returned to the Faroe Islands, where she married the engineer Jákup Petersen from Signabøur in 1960.