Despite being the mother of a billionaire global superstar, Mandy Teefey found herself in a desperate financial bind this spring — one so dire that she reportedly took out a loan against her personal residence to cover payroll at Wondermind, the mental health startup she co-founded with her daughter, Selena Gomez. According to a Forbes exposé published Saturday, Teefey, who serves as the company’s CEO, made the decision after the startup ran out of operational funds and was unable to pay its full-time staff, estimated at around 15 people, not including freelance contributors and outside vendors.
The financial turmoil reportedly came to a head in March 2025, when Wondermind missed payroll for employees. Staffers were eventually paid for one of the two missed pay periods, but the company is still said to owe "hundreds of thousands of dollars" to freelancers and service vendors. One PR firm alone is allegedly owed approximately $60,000, according to anonymous sources cited in the Forbes report. Despite the financial strain, Wondermind released a statement asserting that the situation had been “rectified,” promising that the remaining payments would be processed by the following Monday.
Emails obtained by Forbes show that employees were informed in March, ironically on a scheduled “wellness day” , that their health insurance benefits were being terminated. Teefey acknowledged the unfortunate timing in the internal email: “We apologize for the email on a wellness day,” it read. “As you are aware, we have been working tirelessly to secure our next round of funding.”
In lieu of coverage, employees were told they would have the option to enroll in COBRA, the federal program allowing for temporary continuation of health benefits under certain circumstances, including job loss or a reduction in hours. For a company rooted in promoting mental fitness and wellness, the chaos within the workplace stood in direct contrast to its public mission. Founded in 2021 with the goal of de-stigmatizing conversations around mental health, Wondermind quickly garnered widespread media attention, bolstered by Gomez’s A-list fame and advocacy for mental well-being. By 2022, the company had reportedly raised $5 million in funding and was considered one of the more promising celebrity-led startups in the wellness space.
However, sources close to the company told Forbes that cracks began to show as early as January 2023, shortly after Mandy Teefey assumed the role of sole CEO. Despite Teefey’s history of managing her daughter's early entertainment career, some insiders suggested she lacked the business acumen to steer a growing startup through financial and strategic challenges. Multiple sources claimed that Teefey had also turned down potentially lucrative partnerships — including a multi-million-dollar deal with Airbnb — simply because the brand insisted on including Gomez in promotional material. These decisions, they say, may have stifled potential growth and funding opportunities.
Wondermind’s chief of staff, Emma Wright, pushed back strongly against those allegations, calling them “insanely, grossly misleading.” Wright defended Teefey’s leadership, emphasizing that her dedication to the team was unshakable during this time of crisis. “She has been singularly focused on keeping everyone’s livelihoods intact and keeping the company growing,” Wright said, adding that Teefey “leads with just pure grace.”
As the company attempts to rebound, Wondermind said it is entering “a new chapter,” one that will hopefully reaffirm its original mission of improving access to and conversations around mental health. “Like many startups, Wondermind has been working through its own set of growing pains,” the company acknowledged in a public statement. “In the coming days, we will be transitioning into a new chapter for Wondermind and continuing our important work in mental fitness that helps hundreds of thousands of people.” Selena Gomez, 32, who reached billionaire status in September 2024 with a net worth estimated at $1.3 billion, has not publicly addressed the financial troubles at Wondermind. Representatives for both the company and Gomez declined to comment when contacted by Page Six.
