Speransky was distraught over his wife's death and buried himself in his work. He sent his daughter to live with a former nurse of the Stephens family who lived along the , opposite Aptekarsky Island. He requested his mother-in-law's help in 1801, when he was promoted to serve as an "Assistant Minister of Justice, as Governor of Finland, as Privy Councillor, and as Secretary of State" to Alexander, the new Tsar of Russia. Eliza was in Vienna when her daughter died. Her charge, , had married Franz Joseph, Prince of Dietrichstein in 1797, and relocated there. In 1801, Eliza was able to return to Saint Petersburg and moved into Speransky's house to care for Speranskaya. The following year when Speranskaya's aunt Marianne married Konstantin Zlobin, Eliza's family with Speranskaya all moved into the home of Marianne's father-in-law, .
