In New York Murray fell in love with Freda Perlberg and they eloped when Freda was 15 years old and Murray was 19! Freda snuck out of the house to get married (she borrowed her sister's fur piece). It was predicted that the marriage wouldn't last a year; it lasted until Murray died 70 years later. Judy was born about a year after the wedding, when Freda was 16. Her brother Victor was born 5 years later.

Judy was in the first class of the Shulamith Hebrew School for Girls in Boro Park and later attended Crown Heights Yeshiva. She was among the first graduates of a Hebrew Teacher's College, Beit Midrash L'Morot.

Judy married Rabbi Bernard Mandelbaum in 1945. He was a rabbinical student at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America at the time. They had 5 children: Joel, Dasi, David, Debbie and Naomi. (Debbie and Naomi are identical twins and the obstetrician did not tell the expecting couple they were having twins until after the first baby was delivered; it was a different world). There are 10 grandchildren and 10 great grandchildren.

While still raising her children, Judy attended Teacher's College of Columbia University, getting a Masters in Guidance. She later earned an MSW from Adelphi University and studied Family Therapy at the Ackerman Institute (when Dr. Nathan Ackerman was still teaching), a revolutionary concept at the time. She worked as a Family Therapist at the Jewish Board of Family Services until she became ill. She tragically died from cancer in 1980, at the age of 56.