Processing the Loss of a Child

Nikki: This kid tried everything and he lived. He really lived like he knew he was only going to have almost 13 years. And that has taught me a lot.

Brent: Welcome to Death Clock. I am your host, Brent Franson. Today we speak with Nikki Mark, author of Tommy's Field: A Story of Love, Loss, and Transformation, about grief and dealing with the loss of her son. About five years ago, Nikki lost her 12-year-old son, Tommy, who went to sleep and didn't wake up. Nikki is an incredible guest, talking us through what her life was like prior to this tragedy and what her relationship with Tommy was like.

Brent: She has another son who's a couple of years younger and is married. We discuss what it was like to go through that tragedy and what it's been like to cope since. As a parent, losing a child is my worst nightmare. There is no greater fear. So I was nervous coming into this conversation because it's something that we don't even want to think about or look at.

Brent: But on the other hand, there's so much to learn from somebody like Nikki who has gone through this worst possible life experience and has come out of it okay, as you'll see. She's a wonderful person and has learned so much from it that I think we can all apply to our own lives, no matter what's happening.

Brent: And so I highly recommend the book, Tommy's Field: A Story of Love, Loss, and Transformation. There's so much wisdom in what Nikki has learned from this experience. I hope you enjoy listening to it as much as I enjoyed the conversation.

Brent: Nikki Mark, welcome to the show.

Nikki: Thank you. Happy to be here.

Brent: I'm excited to have you on, and I'm nervous to have you on. I am a parent—I've got three kids: an eight-year-old, a two-year-old, and a ten-month-old. You tragically lost your 12-year-old son, and we're going to talk about that. That's my worst nightmare, as I imagine it was yours.

Brent: So I feel like there's so much to learn from your story as I've prepared for this episode, but it's a nerve-wracking topic. I'll start by saying thank you so much for sharing and being vulnerable on such a difficult subject—or at least, I perceive it to be that way.

Nikki: Yeah, it's an honor to share my story and what I've learned from it so that other people can learn what I now know without having to go through the experience that I have.

Brent: Maybe we start with the day before. What did your life look like before your son passed? What was a normal day or week like? What were you doing work-wise? What did the family look like in the days or months leading up to this tragedy?

Nikki: I was a busy working mom with two young boys. Tommy was 12, almost 13, and my younger son was ten at the time. I'm married, and I had a career in startup companies for over 22 years, helping build Los Angeles-based startups from the ground up. I was busy. Being from Los Angeles, my husband and I were always driving one kid to soccer in one direction and the other in a different direction, taking hours back and forth in LA traffic.

Nikki: Every day was cruising by so quickly that I thought everything was great. My boys were happy, busy, athletic, doing really well in school, with lots of friends and community. Overnight, all that changed.

Brent: So it was the classic setup: two kids living in Los Angeles, going to soccer practice, trying to make everything work, and everything's great. Those ages are wonderful. Having the contrast now between my eight-year-old and two-year-old, I love both my daughters very much, but it's different. When my daughter got to kindergarten and first grade, it was a lot of fun.

Brent: It sounds so idyllic in that moment. Then what happened? What did that terrible day look like? What happened the day before, and then how did that day unfold?

Nikki: Three days before, I drove Tommy to his soccer match in San Diego—about a two-and-a-half-hour drive from LA on a Friday afternoon. On that car ride, he asked me, "Is it possible to go to sleep and not wake up?" He started talking about life and death and asking those kinds of questions.

Nikki: I thought he was just being his chatty, curious self. Then he said, "It must be really hard for a parent to lose a child." I looked at him and said, "Well, that's not going to happen here." I told him I would go first, and he'd go second—that's the way it works. We started talking about all the signs I would give him to let him know I'm still around.

Nikki: We were not religious or spiritual, and had never had discussions about life, death, or any other world. He went off, played soccer in San Diego, and we had a great weekend. We came back to a busy schedule full of friends and dinners. On Monday night, I took him to practice, came home, and he went to sleep after saying, "I love you."

Nikki: He mentioned needing to see a chiropractor in the morning because his ribs were hurting. We said okay. As an elite athlete, he was always playing and getting checkups. The next morning, he wasn't up for his early morning practice. I went in to wake him, which was highly unusual because he was always one of the first up in the family.

Nikki: He was always ready to go for sports, but he was gone. He was in bed and had passed away overnight. The woman I was the day before was a startup person who knew how to build operations and fix problems ten steps before they happened. I was trained to solve the impossible.

Nikki: There I was that morning, unable to fix it. The reality struck me in that moment: "Oh my God, I cannot control this." Then I thought, "Wait a minute, we just had that conversation where he asked if it was possible to go to sleep and not wake up. What is this about?"

Nikki: I felt in that moment that a part of me died. I felt every emotion possible, literally breaking open. As I thought about our conversation three days prior, I felt a deep sense that this was somehow a plan. This didn't just happen. My child, just 12 years old, went to sleep and didn't wake up.

Nikki: He was playing sports the night before. Things like this don't just happen. Given his questions three days prior, I also remembered that I had great-great-grandparents who had lost a 12-year-old boy in their time. I felt that there must be a cycle of loss in my family that had made its way to me.

Nikki: These were concepts I had never considered as a busy, real-world working mother, but in that moment, they made perfect sense. It was awful. Even though I could construct a story around it to give context and curiosity, it was the beginning of a horrible tragedy.

Brent: Just hearing you describe it makes my heart pound and palms sweat. It's a parent's worst nightmare. In that morning, was it immediately obvious, or was there a moment of calling an ambulance hoping to fix it?

Nikki: It was immediate. I called my husband, and my younger son came in. There was no hiding from what was happening. I called 911, and the fire department arrived. Of course, there's that initial hope that we can fix this, save him, and that this is a mistake.

Nikki: When the firefighters looked at me and said he likely passed away shortly after going to sleep the night before, complete surrender set in. I literally looked up and telepathically surrendered to every higher power.

Nikki: I said, "Just tell me what to do, because what do you want me to do?" I completely surrendered my entire life.

Brent: Did you go straight to a place of acceptance and surrender, or did you have darker thoughts? What went through your head regarding how you were going to cope?

Nikki: I had two completely different reactions at the same time. One was surrender—I cracked open and started hearing, seeing, and feeling things I never had before. On the other hand, I wondered how I was going to live.

Nikki: I had a younger son who was the priority. How was I going to be the mother he needed? He lost his best friend, mentor, and favorite person in the family. How was I going to be there for him when I wanted to die myself?

Nikki: In that moment, you don't know how you'll get through another minute. My husband and I agreed our younger son was the priority and that we would get through this together. As our house started filling up that day, a friend suggested building Tommy's legacy. That brought me back to our discussion driving to San Diego, where I told him I wanted to refurbish a dirt field in a park into a soccer field for kids.

Nikki: He loved the idea. All of that came together as a potential legacy. I found reasons that day to survive to the next: to honor Tommy, build a legacy, and be there for my younger son. None of it was about surviving for myself; if it were just for me, I don't know if I could have done it.

Nikki: I had to find bigger reasons, and my boys were those reasons.

Brent: That happened literally that day, while people came to console you in the darkest moment. You referred back to that conversation and decided how to make it to tomorrow. Here we are five years later, and what you decided on that day remains true today.

Nikki: 100%. I sat on my couch as hundreds of people filled our home—a community I didn't even know I had, which I was so grateful for. I had two opposite experiences: one part of my brain was focused on surviving for my younger son and building this legacy, while another part felt guided by something higher as I cracked open.

Nikki: I became a new person the day he left. I knew immediately that nothing I had been through before mattered—all the startups, late nights, and beautiful daily checklists didn't matter anymore. I knew instantly what did.

Nikki: That day, all of that no longer mattered. I knew instantly what did.

Brent: How would you describe getting back to a "new normal"? The person you were before is irrevocably different.

Brent: When did you laugh as a family again? When did you feel like you were entering a phase that felt more like a new normal? How long did that take, and was it different for each family member?

Nikki: Tommy's spirit was all about play—he was always laughing, smiling, dancing, and playing sports. One of my reasons for living was to honor him, not just by building his legacy, but by learning from him and being the way I knew he would want me to be.

Nikki: A couple of months after he passed away, a friend invited us to a comedy show. I told my husband there was no way—life was too dark. Some days I couldn't even get off the couch. He picked me up, put me in the car, and said we had to go, even just for an hour.

Nikki: We sat in the darkest booth in the place, and I laughed. I had my first laugh, feeling confused and guilty. Then a voice dropped in and said, "You lost more than anyone. To honor him is to laugh." That was my first lesson: I needed to learn how to play, maybe more than ever before.

Nikki: Every day, I opened myself to the possibility of a laugh or a smile. Every time I did, I was reminded that it was okay and that it honored him. That was the beginning of allowing myself permission to feel joy again.

Nikki: It took two or three years before I really felt in my body again and proud of how far we had come as a family. We all grieve differently and channel our love and pain in distinct ways, but around the three-year mark, we became more comfortable with our new reality.

Brent: Did your relationship with your husband survive?

Nikki: Yes. The day Tommy left, my husband looked at me and said, "We will not be a tragic family. We will get through this together. Do you understand?" Trauma does interesting things to your body; my head was pounding and ears ringing, so I read his lips and agreed.

Nikki: We agreed our remaining son was the priority. We made a few key decisions that day without knowing how we'd achieve them. We stay close because this is an experience few others understand, allowing us to be there for each other in a unique way.

Nikki: We also gave each other the space and freedom to grieve without judgment, which continues to this day.

Brent: It's striking how much got decided on that day, alongside the conversation three days before. It reminds me of my sister, who is much more spiritual than I am. If I'm having a bad day, she'll point out that it's a full moon.

Brent: For her, it's definitely the full moon. I'm open to being wrong, and I love her—she's connected in ways I'm not.

Brent: My initial reaction might be to see the conversation as coincidental, but what do you make of that conversation happening just days before he passed?

Nikki: There was nothing rational about the moment he left; all I could do was feel. My brain froze, but I felt deeply and told my husband that this was part of a bigger plan. The startup problem-solver in me went on a mission to figure out what that plan was.

Nikki: I wanted to know: if Tommy did his part, what was mine? As my rational side took practical steps to build a legacy, my other side went on a deep exploration of whether it was possible to connect spiritually with my son.

Nikki: Was it possible he knew this was going to happen? While having a mother-son conversation, was there also a soul-level conversation happening? I had never thought about my soul before; I used to be much more practical, like you.

Nikki: As I've opened my heart and mind to possibilities, I live between two worlds: a practical world for my younger son, and one filled with imagination and heart for my older son. I stay open to both.

Brent: Do you feel he knew something explicitly, or was experiencing symptoms? There's evidence of an untestable heart condition, but it's unclear why he passed, and it showed no symptoms beforehand.

Brent: Do you feel he was sensing something physical, or was it a deeper sense of knowing unrelated to physical symptoms?

Nikki: He had chest pains the week before. I took him to the doctor and was told they were growing pains associated with puberty—completely normal. But when he asked if it was possible to go to sleep and not wake up, I mentioned his grandmother passing away peacefully that way.

Nikki: I asked why he was asking, and he said he had a dream that happened. I said I didn't know if you could die in dreams, and he clarified, "No, Mom, I died in my dream."

Nikki: I reassured him not to worry. Only later did I remember having a dream a week before he left where something happened to him. I woke up with panic, but heard his voice and moved on. He had a condition that even a pediatric cardiologist at UCLA couldn't fully explain after autopsy—a condition that couldn't have been tested for beforehand.

Nikki: Nobody could explain why a 12-year-old athlete would go to sleep and not wake up, given the untestable condition they observed.

Nikki: Nobody could explain why a healthy 12-year-old athlete would pass away in his sleep like that.

Brent: What would you go back and tell yourself from when Tommy was 8 or 10 about how you interacted with him? Do you have regrets about looking at your phone too much or taking work trips?

Brent: What would you do differently prior to his passing, based on what you've learned through this experience?

Nikki: The biggest lesson I've learned is that I would have taken more risks growing up. I would have done everything I wanted to do instead of talking myself out of it or worrying about what others thought.

Nikki: I was a private, shy person. I wanted to sing and be on stage as a child, but I never told anyone. Tommy was the opposite—he wanted to sing, perform, play soccer, and try everything.

Nikki: On our drive to San Diego, I reviewed his life with him and expressed how proud I was that he tried so many things he wanted to do, wishing I had had that courage at his age.

Nikki: He has given me the courage to write a book, build a field, and try new experiences without overthinking them. Now I say, "Let's do it, let's make it fun."

Nikki: I can feel him encouraging me to soak up life. When we take our last breath, that's what will matter. It gives me peace knowing he tried everything and truly lived his nearly 13 years.

Nikki: It fills me with peace knowing that this kid tried everything he could and truly lived his almost 13 years. That has taught me a lot.

Brent: So you don't look back with guilt over minor moments, like being strict during potty training or pushing him on homework? Do you have compassion for yourself in retrospect?

Brent: You've developed compassion for yourself.

Nikki: I used to have "what if" thoughts, but I remember how we used to tell him to get off FaceTime and do his homework. After he left, we realized how many friends he had connected with across the city through social media and FaceTime.

Nikki: Building relationships and community was much more important than the homework tasks we assigned. Thank God he didn't always listen to us.

Nikki: I've apologized in my mind for being overly strict about small things like a cookie, which seemed important then for building good habits, but were unimportant in retrospect.

Brent: It sounds like you decided early on that standard therapy and medication weren't going to be your primary path, opting for alternative processing methods. What made you feel those weren't right for you, and what did you learn from alternative methods?

Brent: Why was your instinct that traditional paths weren't the answer?

Nikki: The day he left, sitting on the couch, half of me was connected to another space, and half was looking at reality. I finally understood what it meant to feel depressed, anxious, or want to die.

Nikki: I understood why people feel that way and why words alone can't fix it. I knew talk therapy would take too long to get to the heart of my trauma. I did visit a therapist who honestly admitted, "Your head is fine; your heart is broken. What can I do for you?"

Nikki: That confirmed I needed something more. I also felt medications would numb and suppress what I needed to feel.

Nikki: My intuition told me to feel every ounce of the trauma to connect with something deeper. Friends and spiritual guides advised that while medication offers short-term relief, feeling the emotions fully was key to connecting with my son's spirit.

Nikki: They advised me to keep my heart open to communicate through feeling, so that's what I did.

Nikki: I chose to keep my heart open and feel everything fully, as feeling is how connection happens.

Nikki: I felt every ounce of it and kept my heart open.

Brent: A lot of what you describe sounds similar to experiences with psychedelics. Was that part of your alternative strategy or spirituality?

Nikki: Spirituality came first through dreams, visits from ancestors, and messages. Someone suggested trying psilocybin mushrooms for a direct spiritual experience. Willing to try anything to ease the deep pain, I agreed.

Nikki: I had a private, safe one-on-one guided experience. It provided a short break from the trauma looping in my mind and established a strong connection with my son.

Nikki: I received direct messages that brought peace and led me further down a journey of alternative healing, keeping me connected to my son's spirit.

Nikki: What it did most was interrupt the constant loop of trauma in my brain—the recurring visual and audible memory of finding him. That session helped rebuild neural pathways, stopping the loop in a way that saved years of therapy.

Nikki: It shifted my brain from looping trauma to building new pathways, offering immense healing.

Nikki: It helped break the traumatic loops and allowed me to move forward constructively.

Nikki: It interrupted those circuits and gave me space to heal.

Nikki: It achieved what I didn't even know was possible.

Brent: It's important to approach these methods carefully in the right setting. Facing intense pain directly is a normal human response to severe loss, rather than a medical issue to suppress.

Brent: Does that description resonate with your experience?

Brent: Does that resonate?

Nikki: Yes. Everyone experiences grief in some form—losing a loved one, a friend, or going through divorce. During that session, I walked toward the pain and talked to it.

Nikki: I realized that through the pain, we find our next step. Transmuting it rather than fighting it allowed me to move forward. Surrendering meant not fighting or hiding the pain.

Nikki: Going through the pain directly, rather than numbing it, leads to meaningful healing.

Nikki: Facing it directly can lead to a quicker, albeit painful, path toward transformation.

Nikki: Going through it directly brings you to a new place sooner.

Brent: There's an analogy about buffalo facing storms head-on to pass through them quickly, whereas cows run away and prolong their exposure. Facing discomfort directly seems to be a universal truth.

Brent: Turning toward discomfort helps us process it. Tell us about Tommy's Field and your work creating green spaces in Los Angeles.

Brent: Tell us about the initiative, what you've been doing, and how it's progressing.

Brent: I commend your work. Los Angeles has a severe shortage of accessible public green space for active kids like Tommy.

Brent: Tell us about the initiative, your accomplishments, and the challenges you've faced.

Nikki: LA lacks public field space—we have about four fields per 100,000 residents compared to 17 nationally, and ours are often locked or permitted. Tommy used to jump fences just to find places to play soccer.

Nikki: There was a local dirt field full of holes for 20 years. After Tommy passed, a friend suggested building that field in his memory so his spirit of play could benefit other children. My husband named it Tommy's Field.

Nikki: We worked hard to raise $1.2 million, navigating city politics. The first field was sponsored by LAFC and the LA Galaxy—rival MLS teams whose academies Tommy played for.

Nikki: It opened to huge success, hosting games day and night, including one of the city's largest flag football leagues.

Nikki: A local school serving foster children requested a field as well. We raised $1.4 million to build a second Tommy's Field at Vista Del Mar, supported by donors and Mayor Karen Bass.

Nikki: It's amazing how Tommy brought rival teams and diverse communities together around youth sports. It taught me the importance of embodying play in my own life.

Nikki: We are planning a third field in downtown Los Angeles next.

Nikki: I want to share his spirit of play and learn to embody it myself.

Nikki: Not only do I want to share his spirit of play, but I'm learning how to embody it myself.

Brent: How can people support Tommy's Field?

Nikki: Our foundation is tm23foundation.org (TM23 represents Tommy Mark and his jersey number, 23). 100% of donations go directly to field projects. We host an annual Mother's Day tournament for 250 kids across the city. People can visit the website to support or simply come out and play on the fields.

Nikki: The best way to honor my son is to bring a ball out and play.

Nikki: We offer lots of free play on the fields, which is super fun.

Nikki: They offer a lot of free play and super, super fun.

Brent: You wrote Tommy's Field: A Story of Love, Loss, and Transformation about your experience. It's available on Amazon. Is there anything else you'd like to share about the book?

Nikki: I wrote it because it reflects an inner and outer journey of healing. Building Tommy's field mirrored my internal healing process. The book shares what I've learned so others can gain those insights without undergoing the same tragedy.

Nikki: It's a gift from his spirit and mine to anyone undergoing a personal transformation.

Nikki: It's a story offered to help others navigate their own journeys of change and healing.

Nikki: It's truly a gift to anyone on a journey of transformation.

Brent: Where do you recommend people go if they are experiencing similar loss? Are there support resources or organizations you recommend?

Brent: What advice do you offer to someone who has unexpectedly lost a loved one?

Nikki: What helped me most was saying yes to everyone offering support. Losing a child affects an entire community. Allowing people to help gives others an opportunity to connect and support, creating healing for everyone involved.

Nikki: Everyone's path to healing is different, but opening up to support shows how good community and humanity can be.

Nikki: Allowing help lets people show the best of humanity.

Brent: Thank you, Nikki Mark, for joining us and sharing your story, and honoring Tommy's memory with us today.

Nikki: Thank you.

Brent: Death Clock is recorded in Boulder, Colorado, produced by Patrick Gudino, with music by Patrick Lee, and hosted by Brent Franson, founder and CEO of Death Clock.