Abby Mosher turned a personal tragedy into purpose, creating one of the most magical places for children in Coconut Creek—Tomorrow’s Rainbow.
Tomorrow’s Rainbow is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that provides free mental health support services for children ages 3 through 18, their caregivers, and adults healing from grief, loss, or trauma. What makes Tomorrow’s Rainbow special is that it incorporates animals—specifically, horses, goats, and mini donkeys—into its program, providing outdoor, experiential sessions where children explore their world through interactions with the animals.
This year, Tomorrow’s Rainbow will celebrate its 20th year of providing these life-saving services to children—services inspired by Mosher’s difficult loss. On a family vacation in Texas 25 years ago, a head-on collision took the life of Mosher’s husband, Paul. She and her 7-year-old son, Dustin, survived but were thrust into a world of grief and loss that didn’t have many resources available for children.
“When we came back to Florida, I thought, with Broward County being the sixth-largest school district in the nation, that there’d be tons of resources available,” says Mosher. “But I found that Broward County had no children’s grief center.”
Thankfully, Mosher had insurance, so her son was able to receive individual therapy. But that therapy had its limitations. “The social isolation for him was devastating,” explains Mosher. “He didn’t have a single friend he could relate to.”
That’s when Mosher decided she wanted to create a space where families could come together with other families who knew what it was like to have someone important in their life die. She also wanted to make it accessible for those who couldn’t afford individual therapy.
Mosher didn’t know at the time that her newfound dream would quickly align with her childhood dream of owning a horse. Through her work with the parent-teacher association, she knew Wally Hennessey, a Hall of Fame harness track racer. She and her son would go to the track to watch Hennessey race.
“After the race, Wally would take his goggles off, and he’d be covered in sand, and the horse’s nostrils would be flaring from winning the race, and Wally would be perfectly peaceful,” recalls Mosher, who wanted whatever that peacefulness was. When the Hennesseys introduced her to a woman with miniature horses, she knew the animals had to be part of her program.
Three years later, Mosher met her current husband, Shel, and shared with him her dream of supporting grieving children with horses, and he was on board. Together, they purchased a 2.5-acre mini-ranch adjacent to Tradewinds Park, and in 2005, Tomorrow’s Rainbow opened its doors.
It wasn’t until after opening and going through trainings with the Equine Assisted Growth and Learning Association that Mosher realized how powerful horses are in the healing process. “Horses are the only animal that can mirror our behavior,” explains Mosher. “The horse is the mirror for the child. So if the child doesn’t like what they see, if they adjust themselves, the horse will adjust as well.” Mosher likens it to a football player watching game tapes to get better. With horses, you watch their behavior to improve your own.
Tomorrow’s Rainbow offers bereavement group sessions and individual equine-assisted psychotherapy. When children first arrive, they undergo a screening process. Those who have suffered trauma in addition to grief are put into individual equine-assisted psychotherapy, where they work with a horse, an equine specialist, and a therapist. “We have to support the trauma before we can support the grief,” explains Mosher. “So we get them into our individual services and then when they’re ready, they can transfer to our bereavement group services.”
A bereavement session begins with introductions under a large tree, followed by an activity, horse grooming/interaction, and then play. “Kids can’t stay in their grief for a long time,” explains Mosher. “So we have to have opportunities for them to laugh and be kids.” During the bereavement session, adults are in a facilitated talk circle and given some psychoeducation on raising grieving children.
Children often tell their stories through the activities, acting out what happened at the puppet theater, or building something related to their loss at the LEGO table. Program facilitators are trained to honor the children’s stories and provide the space for them to express without judgment or shame. “We’re not teaching them how to grieve,” explains Mosher. “Children are experts in their own grief. We are supporting them. We’re not giving advice, we’re not problem-solving. It’s not a problem we can fix.”
At the end of a session, children are taken into a room filled with teddy bears where they can symbolically light a candle to remember their loved one. These charming, child-friendly touches run across the property, from the puppet theater to the teddy bear hospital to the wishing well. “We have dissolving paper so the children can write messages to their loved ones and put them in the wishing well, and the paper will dissolve, but the words will stay floating on top of the water until they’re ready to swirl it,” says Mosher.
To ensure that children of all economic backgrounds have access to these services, there is no cost for the bereavement groups. A combination of corporate and private donations, along with grants from organizations including Parkland Cares, Broward Behavioral Health Coalition, and the Jim Moran Foundation, helps offset the cost of individual psychotherapy sessions, which are normally $150 per hour. The organization runs on a tight budget, but for Mosher, the priority is the impact these services have on children.
“They come in with the weight of the world on their shoulders, and they leave joyful,” enthuses Mosher. “The energy completely changes when they realize they’re not alone and they don’t have all that stuff bottled up inside anymore, because they had a safe space for it to come out. And nobody made fun of them, nobody told them how to feel, and nobody tried to change them in any way, they just honored their journey.”
In addition to its on-site work, Tomorrow’s Rainbow has a “Grief on the Go” trailer to support underserved communities in Broward and Palm Beach counties through partnerships with nonprofits that work with at-risk children.
For Mosher, Tomorrow’s Rainbow has become her life’s mission. “I feel like I don’t work a day in my life,” she says. “To see the children and the impact this program has on their lives is a blessing. I knew we were going to help children heal. But what I didn’t know is that we would literally be saving lives, and that’s pretty powerful.”
For more information, visit TomorrowsRainbow.org.