Empowering Families Through Advocacy: An Exclusive Interview with Julianne Michelle of Mommy's Heart

I founded Mommy’s Heart after recognizing a vital need during my prolonged journey through the Family Court system. My aim is to offer other families the support and resources to which I never had access.

Having been an actress since a young age, I was afforded unique opportunities to champion important causes. I’ve always loved serving my community, and I never foresaw running my own non-profit one day. I've also nurtured meaningful relationships throughout my career that have been instrumental in garnering support and momentum for our cause. We have many high-profile celebrities and industry leaders on our board and on our event host committees who have helped us raise awareness.

Mommy's Heart has accomplished some wonderful achievements this year, and fundraising is critical to supporting our efforts. We onboarded our first full-time licensed attorney, who is managing several parents' cases with the help of our talented law school students. We are assisting 13 parents with their legal needs in various states, including New York, California, Ohio, and Florida. Mommy's Heart also drafted legislation that will make it more difficult for abusers to weaponize the system against their victims. Our proposed legislation was introduced by NYS Assembly Member Rebecca Seawright to the Judiciary Committee in Albany, and you can read the provisions of Bill A08361 on the State Assembly site: nyassembly.gov.

Our Mommy's Heart Winter Fête will be held at a beautiful penthouse in Palm Beach, FL, overlooking the ocean from 6 pm-10 pm. The evening will include a seated dinner for approx. 30 esteemed guests (6 pm-8 pm) at $1000 per person, special guest speakers and VIPs, auctions, entertainment, and more.

Our Winter Fête Host Committee includes Sally Kirkland, Marysol Patton (Housewives of Miami), Sean Stone, Myles von Trapp, Florence Anthony, Samuel K. Kelley, MD., Amy Carlson, Nellie Sciutto, and Alexandra Greenawalt.

Our event sponsors include Pola Palm Beach, Noho Nails, Casa D'Angelo, Prezzo, Bricktops, Lynora's, The Capital Grille, Atlas Event Rental, Candy's Cake Pops, 4 S Liquors, and Scotti's Wines & Liquors.

There are many ways to get involved. There are opportunities for sponsoring or hosting an event with us, corporate underwriting, mental health volunteering, and for law school students and licensed attorneys to join our legal team. To learn more, please visit:

mommysheartfoundation.com/get-involved

For our March 12 event, there are volunteer opportunities for professional musicians and DJs, bartenders and servers, chefs, drivers, and auction bid spotters.

We haven’t made a significant difference in anyone’s life yet. We just started rolling out our legal and mental health services. We have saved parents tens of thousands of dollars on legal fees. We have facilitated reunification between parent and child in one case. We are hoping to onboard local licensed attorney volunteers in New York, Ohio, California, and Florida, where we have our greatest demand.

I studied clinical social work at Columbia University and obtained my MSW and later my LMSW. It’s easy to neglect one’s mental health while facing the onslaught of the family court system. All you can think about is protecting your child, and the fear of losing your child can be debilitating. Being separated from your child or not knowing if your child is safe, healthy, or happy is a nightmare no parent should have to endure. My education and training experience while attending Columbia University School of Social Work taught me that if I want to effectively help others, I need to meet them where they’re at and not judge someone’s response to adverse events, as we all favor different coping styles, acknowledging that some may be more healthy than others. Coupling my education with my own personal life experience, I learned that while validating one’s feelings and experiences is very important, the emphasis should remain on looking forward and finding ways to create positive change. The family court retraumatizes abuse survivors and exploits innocent children for monetary gain. It has absolutely no regard for families. This is why we offer mental health services at Mommy’s Heart. We appreciate that our legal services are in the highest demand, but we also understand that families need nurturing, compassion, and plenty of emotional support to remain steadfast on their journey with warrior strength and will.

Addressing the growing demand for services is our main challenge while continuing to fundraise so that we can expand our services to meet the huge need. Putting one foot in front of the other and crossing off items on my to-do list each day helps our foundation move toward progress.

Our goal is to be able to offer free legal representation in every state so that no parent ever has to fear reporting abuse again. I’d also like to provide free supervised visitation services to parents who are wrongfully court-mandated to see their children under supervision. These parents have no history of criminality, drug abuse, or violence, yet for unknown reasons, they are prohibited from seeing their children unless they pay per hour for someone to supervise them when with their children. Many parents cannot afford to pay for supervision, and because of this, many parents are forced to go months, even years, without any contact with their children. I’d like to recruit volunteer LCSWs and LMSWs who can facilitate supervised visitation at no cost to these parents to avoid unnecessary separation of parent and child.

Please visit our website, www.mommysheartfoundation.com and stay connected with us on Facebook mommysheartfoundation and on Instagram @mommysheartfoundation. Also, subscribe to our substack mommysheart.substack.com/!

Mommy's Heart, Inc. is the only charity of its kind offering these aforementioned services to parents and children suffering from legal and financial retaliation by their abusers in the court system. There is a GREAT and growing need that has not been met. Mommy’s Heart aims to help all parents who are unable to receive help elsewhere due to the complex nature of their cases and the inability to find other agencies willing or able to invest the time and resources needed to advocate for their rights.