The Lautners on the set of their podcast The Squeeze
Chanelle Whitacre
When life gave them lemons, Tay and Taylor Lautner decided to double down on mental health aid.
The couple—one who’s spent the lion’s share of his life in the celebrity spotlight and the other who was working as a hospital nurse at the outset of Covid—realized their shared passion for destigmatizing and supporting mental health during the pandemic through their own personal experiences.
“Obviously Taylor has been in the spotlight for a very long time and Covid was the time for him to sit and think. And we both kindof were dealing with our mental health at the same time, even though at completely different ends of the spectrum. I think it’s really cool that we got to do it together because we’ve really learned how to rely on the other,” Tay Lautner says.
“I went through a few months of just becoming kindof a shell of a human and not realizing it because there’s no time to think about yourself when there are people who are dying. It didn’t really hit me until one day Taylor pointed it out to me. He was like, ‘Hey, are you OK?’ And I was like, ‘Yeah, you know, I just worked three nights in a row and I’m tired but I’m fine.’ And he said, ‘No, are you really doing OK though?’ That was the first time I had ever been asked that or ever really thought about checking in with myself.”
After a difficult decision to leave her position when round-the-clock immersion in crisis and a bout with Covid took a significant toll on her mental health, Lautner says she knew she’d found a new calling. The result? Her founding of The Lemons Foundation, the pair launching a podcast called The Squeeze and their latest endeavor, a mental health summit on September 20 in Malibu.
“For a long time, I didn’t want to leave the hospital. I was always told that, ‘You’re not a real nurse if you aren’t in a hospital or you’re not saving lives, if you’re not doing it this type of way. But I’m so thankful for what I went through and am now able to do the things that I’m doing now, I wouldn’t trade it for the world. And to have a partner that fully just supports me in my dreams is amazing,” she says.
The idea to launch The Lemons Foundation came slowly and then all at once, Lautner says. “When I left the hospital, I knew I wanted to talk more about my mental health and to help people because a lot of people were struggling, not just the healthcare workers. Everyone was isolated. Everyone was going through something.”
“I started a blog called Lemons by Tay. I had a little notebook in my office and I was writing down different names, trying to brainstorm and be artsy. And then I was like… Lemons. Life is actually like just chucking lemons at me right now. I’m bruised, I’m being pelted. So that’s how it started. And then I wanted to figure out a way to give back and provide resources to people. I woke up one day and I was like, ‘I’m going to start a nonprofit.’ I had no idea what I was doing, but I ended up figuring it out fairly quickly so I knew that it was what I was supposed to be doing.”
Six months later came the idea to start The Squeeze, which today counts hundreds of thousands of listeners. “I’d never listened to a single podcast, and I told Taylor, ‘you’re going to do it with me,’ because he’s one of the wisest people I know,” she says. “When we started, full-time husband, part-time co-host was his little slogan. We filmed our first two episodes, him interviewing me and then me interviewing him—and we were both hooked. Two and a half years later, it’s still the most fun, rewarding thing.”
The seeds of a daylong gathering have been germinating for a while. “I wanted to find something that had more of a community approach that would be feasible for people to go to and be together and learn something,” she says. “I’ve spoken on panels… and there’s always something to learn from people and how they approach their mental health, maybe how they view something, how they handled something. I leave these panels every time being so inspired, so pumped.”
Hosted at the Calamigos Ranch, the event will focus on destigmatizing topics including grief, addiction, anxiety and motherhood, through conversations with influential voices. Many of the primarily female speakers have been guests on the podcast, including Lexi Hensler, Jaclyn Hill, Laura Lee and Chandler Kinney.
Lautner says there will also be clinically trained experts in the room to share resources on topics including sexual violence, as well as activations with, among others, Maybelline—Lautner is an ambassador for the company’s Brave Together initiative—and mental health organization NAMI, for which Lautner is an ambassador.
“I think it’s I think it’s going to be such an impactful thing,” she says. “I want to just keep making the conversation so much more approachable because once you talk about it, it becomes so much less scary.”
Mind Reading (formerly Hollywood & Mind) is a recurring column that features interviews with musicians, actors, athletes, creators and other culture influencers who are elevating conversation and action around mental health, and breaking stigma.